


The Teenage Android

by ChangeTheCircumstances



Series: Brothers [3]
Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Android kids, Brotherly Love, Family, Fluff, Friendship, Gavin and Nines are assholes to each other but they do it with love, Gen, M/M, No damn angst here!, Parent-Child type relationships, Tons of fluff finally!!!, ok a smidge of angst cause i can't help it but not much lol
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-05
Updated: 2018-08-11
Packaged: 2019-06-22 08:18:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 30,146
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15577689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChangeTheCircumstances/pseuds/ChangeTheCircumstances
Summary: Months pass without a word from Nines. Gavin really starts to wonder if he'll ever see the android again, at least until Nines shows up unannounced at his front door with a child and a teenager at his side.





	1. Nines Returns

**Author's Note:**

> A massive thank you to everyone who's been reading this series! This story will be short, relatively so considering the chapters' length. I also plan it to be the last one for the brother's series. There could be more in the future but I'd rather have a definite end right here rather than leave people hanging and not knowing if there will be more.
> 
> Again, that being said, I could write more for this series down the road, maybe even a one-shot here or there, but for now this will be it. A massive thank you again and I hope you enjoy. Also, I know this is coming out very close to when I published the last chapter of the last story and I don't think I'll get another update out too soon. I just happened to be working on this at the same time I was finishing up the last story.
> 
> That being said, I hope you enjoy again and thank you for reading <3

It was Gavin’s off day and he wasn’t really sure what he wanted to do. It was May and the weather was too warm for his liking so he’d probably stay inside. Of course, he could always go and annoy Elijah, see how much bigger Spooner was getting…

Months after the kidnapping and some news outlets were still talking about it. However, the important thing was that it was behind them, the people involved had been prosecuted, and he and Elijah were healing from it. Gavin could tell that Elijah’s initial paranoia had worn off a bit but they still talked every day whether through texts or calls. It was a constant comfort and both responded to each other immediately no matter what.

After their reconciliation, Gavin had been thankful to have his brother back. But after the kidnapping incident, he no longer took the relationship for granted. It was awful that the kidnapping had to happen for Gavin to learn that, but he sure as hell wasn’t going to ignore the lesson because of it.

However, that didn’t mean he went to Elijah’s every day. Even with their constant communication, he sometimes needed his own down time and staying in his apartment was nice. Besides, Boo seemed pretty playful this morning. Maybe he’d binge watch something and get Boo to run circles with a laser pointer or something.

Gavin walked around, picking up bits of trash and tidying a few things but not being too focused on cleaning. He’d just had coffee for breakfast and was thinking about ordering in for lunch. He turned on some TV show that he vaguely knew the plot of and threw things for Boo to chase. It looked to be a lazy Saturday, up until someone knocked at his door. Was it Connor? Gavin was pretty sure he had work today so then who…

He walked over to see through the peep hole only to freeze at what he saw. It had been months. It couldn’t-but no way was it anything—

Gavin threw open the door and his shock only grew. In front of him stood Nines and beside him were a kid and a teenager of all things.

“Hello Gavin. It’s good to see you again.”

The smile that showed was soft. Gavin almost responded to it but words fell out of his mouth before he could stop them, still utterly shocked. “What the fuck?”

“Good to see your eloquent way with the English language hasn’t changed either,” Nines smirked and the two girls laughed, giving Gavin an idea that Nines had definitely talked about him. “May we come in?”

If it had just been Nines, Gavin would have reacted instinctively, yelling out no and slamming the door in his face. It had been months! Without a word! And now he was just showing up and expecting Gavin to let him in?! But with the two kids at Nines’ side, well it brought up too many questions and Gavin couldn’t very well throw the door in their faces.

“Yeah…” Gavin mumbled under his breath, his brow furrowed as he only slightly moved back. He watched as the teenager became wide eyed at seeing Boo.

“Oh, she’s adorable!”

“She bites,” Gavin said under his breath as he closed the door. He looked at the girls, looked to Nines, and then decided he was at least going to try and be a semi responsible adult and not curse too much in front of them. “Can I speak to you alone for a moment?”

“Of course,” Nines said and god, Gavin couldn’t remember for the life of him why he’d missed that smug as fuck face.

Gavin stomped over to his bedroom. Nines followed and Gavin quickly slammed the door and yelled, “What the fuck Nines?!”

“If you were trying to keep them from hearing your curses, you have just failed spectacularly,” chuckled Nines.

“That’s not the point! It’s been months. Months! You said-I mean you didn’t promise fucking anything but I still expected-oh I don’t know. But you can’t just show up like this! And who the hell are they?! And just—”

“Gavin,” Nines gently said, finally stepping forward and placing his hands on Gavin’s shoulders. Gavin begrudgingly looked up, still glaring. “I apologize for how long it took.”

Gavin’s eyes widen. He sarcastically cried in a high pitched voice, “Were you dying!? You were sick with some weird robo virus weren’t you!?”

Nines rolled his eyes. “I was not.”

“Oh, well in that case nothing you say is going to make this any better,” Gavin growled out, the sarcasm gone as he threw up his hands and stepped back. “You could have called at least once! Sent a damn text message!”

“You’re right. I could have and probably should have. But you must understand, when I woke up I practically went straight to the FBI,” replied Nines. “I had to do a great deal of thinking, had to find my path so to speak.”

“Which apparently took three fucking months,” grumbled Gavin. “And it doesn’t explain who the hell the girls are.”

“I’ll explain everything. How about while on a walk? The girls have never been to Detroit and I promised I’d take them downtown.”

“Well what about my work?” Gavin asked in an attempt to remain aloof and act like other things were more important. However, that thought process was a complete lie. Gavin was curious as hell even if he was still pissed off.

“You’re off today,” smirked Nines.

“How the hell do you know that!?”

“I called your precinct and they said you were off.”

Gavin threw his hands up in the air with another exaggerated cry. “Argh, you fucking planned this didn’t you, you plastic prick!”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. The opportunity to see you just fell into my lap,” smirked Nines.

“You fucking conniving toaster!”

Nines laughed. “I have missed this.”

“I’m sure you fucking have,” Gavin growled out. “You want to go on a walk? We’ll go on a fucking walk then!”

He pushed passed Nines and threw open his bedroom door with a huff, his anger quickly diminishing when he spotted the two girls. They’d managed to get close to Boo though the cat was still unwilling to let the strangers pet her. Gavin couldn’t bring himself to be angry at them. They were just kids after all and he still had no idea what Nines was playing at. Instead, Gavin tried to speak in his nicest possible voice and said, “So I hear Nines promised that you’d get a chance to walk around downtown, huh?”

“Yes,” the older one said, hopping up and walking over. “I’m Dipsikha. It’s nice to finally meet you Detective Reed.”

The way she said his name had Gavin nervous. Christ, what had Nines been telling these kids about him? The younger also walked over, actually sticking her hand out as she said, “I’m Janay.”

Gavin hesitantly took it, the action a bit weird and very adult coming from someone who couldn’t be more than eight years old. “Hi,” he awkwardly said. “And you can just call me Gavin kid-argh!”

“Don’t call me kid,” Janay said with a glare as she crushed Gavin’s hand in what was definitely not human strength.

“Ow! What the hell!”

“Janay,” groaned Dipsikha as she glared at her. She quickly turned an apologetic smile on Gavin who’d managed to snatch his hand back. “Sorry, she’s touchy about her age. It’s not very easy for her.”

“Her is standing right here,” Janay grumbled back as she crossed her arms and made a pouting face.

Nines chuckled from behind Gavin and Dipsikha rolled her eyes, the motion familiar between the three, like they’d been in this situation before. That made Gavin flip a glare on Nines and mutter, “You could have warned me.”

Nines didn’t respond though and said, “How about we get this day started?”

“Great!” Dipsikha excitedly said, the incident already forgotten. “I’ve already mapped out a few shops we can visit.”

The girls led the way and Gavin just angrily grabbed his keys. He followed them out, rubbing his hand as he swore it was going to end up bruising. So the younger one was an android, there was one small piece of information Gavin had. But what about the older one? He honestly couldn’t tell and now only had more questions.

He didn’t say anything as he followed them, still confused and silently fuming. Again, he was trying to be a responsible adult around the two girls even if he’d already failed multiple times.

They went to the transit stop and Gavin didn’t argue, not feeling like driving anyways. The girls got into two seats and Gavin sat behind them. He kept his arms crossed and stuck his legs out, making it clear he was very much still pissed at Nines and not interested in dealing with the android just yet. However, before Gavin could stop him, Nines grabbed him, shoved him into the next seat, and sat down.

Ok, to hell with trying to be responsible.

“If I’d wanted you to sit here, I would have asked you, you fucking toaster.”

The girls laughed in front of them before quickly turning to their own conversations and staring out the windows. Gavin also tried to glare out the window but Nines nudged him. He knew the android wouldn’t stop until he acknowledged him so he decided to cut to the chase and just whipped his head around to glare at him. “What?”

“I am sorry,” Nines softly said, making it clear he was just having this conversation with Gavin and not the girls. “I didn’t think you’d be this upset.”

“I’m not upset.”

Nines looked him over with a patronizing eye. “Clearly,” he dryly said.

Gavin bit back the other curses and insults that floated to his lips and settled on, “You…I thought…after what we’d been through I just thought we…” Gavin couldn’t bring himself to finish the thought, cheeks going pink.

“Yes?”

Gavin refused to answer.

Nines let out a tired sigh but instead of pushing Gavin to answer, he said, “If you don’t forgive me, so be it. I do understand. But I would like to try and make you see why this waited so long.”

Gavin glanced at him, signaling he was listening but still refusing to respond.

“Like I said, I went into the FBI straight away. The FBI is an organization, there are always orders coming from someone. And I’d been brought in by Sara. I was never…I had never been on my own and I’d never opened myself up to any other option besides the FBI. I needed to figure out who I was. What I wanted to do. I needed that time to myself to figure out the life I wanted and it did take a while. I’m sorry for that.”

Gavin’s heart had softened with each spoken word. Nines was being incredibly sincere here and despite his irritation, Gavin was slowly finding that he couldn’t stay mad. Still, there was a bit of bitterness in his voice as he mumbled out, “Well, was it worth it?”

“I’d like to think so.”

“And so you got everything figured out and then planned all this to a) make sure I had a full day for you to torture me, and b) bring the two girls along so I couldn’t immediately throw you out without feeling like a massive dick. Right?”

There was that asshole smirk Gavin was familiar with. “Precisely.”

“Christ, well at least tell me you didn’t just kidnap two kid—” Gavin stopped and quickly changed lanes as Janay turned to glare at him. “Two girls.”

“No, this actually has to do with a job.”

Gavin’s anger immediately flared back up. “Oh, so what? This is just fucking convenient for—”

He stopped though as Nines twisted his body and took one of Gavin’s hands. It was the scarred one. Gavin could feel the skin and the plastic, the little edges between the two materials.

“I would have come back no matter what,” Nines calmly and softly said. “This wasn’t convenience but coincidence. You were my first true friend after Sara, my partner. I always intended on coming back. It just took longer than expected.”

Gavin gulped. This wasn’t exactly a heated moment caught in desperation or even an intimate moment to say goodbye. It was getting a little close to why Gavin hadn’t been able to explain his anger at the android. Just because he’d corrected his emotions and thoughts involving Connor and his brother didn’t mean he was suddenly great at emotions in general. Especially when he was dealing with things he wasn’t very familiar with in the slightest.

Because of that, Gavin snatched his hand back. Nines seemed to take it well, a small, amused noise escaping his lips as he shook his head. He gave Gavin a fond look which Gavin quickly did his best to ignore. Gavin muttered, “So what the hell do you do? What’s the job?”

“I decided to go into the private sector.”

“Wait so…a private investigator? Seriously?” Gavin laughed. “What? You help kids find their lost pets or something?”

“I have, along with gaining intel. on the occasional cheating spouse for the easy money,” Nines replied. “I also solved a twelve year old cold case and helped spoil an assassination attempt.”

“Oh. Well shit,” muttered Gavin, certainly not expecting that. “So it’s…good business I guess?”

“Having my pick of what jobs I wish to do is…freeing in its own way. There’s always money from someone and it does allow an interesting look into human psychology.”

“So what job are you doing for these two?” asked Gavin.

“Well I worked two different jobs for their parents, Mr. and Mrs. Rai. One was a simple investigation of one of their secretaries and the other happened to be the assassination attempt.”

Nines paused like he was waiting for Gavin to respond but that just made him more confused. The way Nines had said ‘their parents’ was an interesting note about the girls. So even if Dipsikha was human, they still viewed each other as sisters and a family. But he had no idea what Nines was trying to get at. “I mean, good on you, but why should I care?”

Letting out a long sigh, Nines was interrupted by Janay who said, “How can you not know? You should be more involved in politics.”

“I’ve had a busy year of late,” Gavin grumbled.

“Mrs. Rai is one of the current Senators of Michigan,” Nines supplied. “The state you live in.”

“I know where Detroit is damn it!” Gavin yelled as the girls just laughed again.

At that point, the bus stopped and Dipsikha jumped up. “Alright! The first shop is just around the corner. Come on!”

She and Janay quickly rushed off the bus with Nines and Gavin close behind. It being the weekend and a warm day meant plenty of humans and androids were out. They headed onto the square where vendors were enticing customers over one way or another. Dipsikha bought an ice cream cone, ok so she was human, and then she and Janay led the way to their first store.

Gavin and Nines both glanced at the covered up Cyberlife store as they passed it. From what Elijah had told him, he and Markus were working hard on getting several stores in Detroit up and running as repair and replacement shops for androids. The test one would begin business in a few more weeks.

It was an interesting idea and Gavin imagined would be incredibly helpful. However, right now they were apparently focusing on clothing and trinket stores as dictated by the two girls. As they walked into the first one, Gavin commented, “I’m surprised you haven’t been to Detroit if your mom’s the Senator.”

“We mostly grew up in DC,” said Janay.

“And I was actually born in Ohio,” Dipsikha added. “We moved to Lansing when I was three, lived there for four years, and then basically went to live in DC when it became clear that was the only time we’d get to spend with mom.”

“We only ever went from Lansing to DC really,” Janay finished.

Gavin just gave a slight nod. There were a few other questions he had in mind but he wasn’t sure if they would be rude or not. He may not care with adults but he had a soft spot for kids. He didn’t want to make them upset, and he still didn’t know what exactly the damn job was that Nines was doing for them. He decided to wait it out and instead asked, “So how the hell is it that your parents trusted this prick with you?”

“They respect him. And he did save our mom’s life,” Dipsikha said.

“During the investigation into one of their secretaries about leaking information,” Nines added, “they both often sat with me in the offices or would walk me through the buildings.”

“Which yes, was completely unnecessary,” Janay said with a roll of her eyes. “But we’d never met an android like him and were curious.”

“And he stuck around to make sure he found who had hired the assassin and make sure they couldn’t do it again,” said Dipsikha, “even though the job was just to confirm it was a threat and then stop the attempt. Most wouldn’t have done that without extra cash.”

They walked through the rows of clothes, Dipsikha seemed interested in looking at the flowery shirts and throws while Janay kept eyeing the leather jackets that were much too big for her.

“I didn’t do the jobs consecutively,” Nines said, “but in total, I’ve spent about three weeks with them.”

“Besides, we’ve dealt with people that are much more strangers than Nines now is,” Dipsikha added.

Janay nodded. “Considering how many people come and go in our parents’ service, it’s nice that we’re with a familiar face right now.”

Well that at least made sense but Gavin still couldn’t help but grumble out, “How the hell do you even like him? He’s constantly spouting bullshit and being an asshole.”

“Not to them,” Nines replied as he came up beside Gavin and leaned down just a bit. “Unlike you, they don’t deserve that kind of treatment.”

“God I hate you! Listen here—”

“You can’t hate him,” interrupted Janay. “You were holding hands on the bus.”

“Fuck off!”

Every head in the store spun to stare at the adult man yelling at the eight year old looking girl to fuck off just as Nines burst into laughter and made Gavin turn even redder. Janay was practically grinning from ear to ear like she’d been hoping to push him into this position.

“Never fucking mind,” Gavin mumbled, “I can see exactly how you’d befriend a prick like this.”

The rest of the time in that store, Gavin kept his head ducked down to avoid the stares that were still being sent his way and just hoped nobody called the cops for something ridiculous like child abuse. That would be fucking awkward.

_Yeah Chris, don’t worry about it. I didn’t steal a child. I mean, I did scream fuck in her face but trust me, she was trying to rile me up._

Just thinking about that conversation had Gavin groaning loud and long as Nines grinned at his side. Eventually they left the store and headed to the next destination on the girls’ path. As they started to walk into another clothing store, Gavin stopped and said, “I think I’ll wait outside on this one.”

“Why?” asked Nines.

“I just feel like getting some sun.”

“You’ve been squinting like a ninety-eight year old man who lost his glasses.”

The girls laughed again as Gavin just glared at him. He pushed down the irritation though because there was a reason he’d said he’d be staying outside. “Just…I’m staying outside. Do you want to join me?” growled Gavin.

Dipsikha whispered, “And he said he hated him,” to which Gavin glared at her too. Nines was looking over the building though, double checking to see if the shop had any other exits. There weren’t any recent threats to the Rais and nothing specifically directed towards the daughters either. However, as they were in his care, he wasn’t going to take chances. Once seeing that the entrance they were standing at was the only one, Nines said, “Enjoy yourselves. If you need anything, I’ll be right out here.”

“Have fun,” Janay said with a wide smirk just as Dipsikha fucking winked.

Gavin just growled in his throat and crossed his arms. He made a point of staring in the opposite direction as he leaned up against the store window. Nines just chuckled and came to stand next to him.

“So what is it you want to know?” asked Nines.

“How old are they?”

“Dipsikha is seventeen. Janay is fifteen.”

“Mentally?” Gavin questioned.

“Yes. Her design is that of an eight year old however.”

Gavin winced at the thought. Sure, people talked about what it would be like to be a kid forever but being an adult, or in this case a teenager, in a kid’s body…that had to have its fare share of difficulties. The girl probably couldn’t express herself in a lot of ways, or was probably frowned upon when she tried to. Having relationships of any kind was probably difficult and dating…well forget that.

“What’s their story?” asked Gavin.

“Janay’s model, YC-002, was the second child model to be introduced. She was awakened and bought fifteen years ago by Mr. and Mrs. Rai as a companion for Dipsikha. They wanted their daughter to have something more than what a simply nanny would give.”

“So they bought a kid because they couldn’t be bothered with having another or adopting one,” Gavin said with a hint of disgust in his voice. “Why would Janay still stay with them—hang on. When androids started deviating she wasn’t taken by the government? They didn’t try and destroy her?”

“I’m getting to that,” supplied Nines. “As Dipsikha grew, she and Janay formed a strong bond, one that made it clear getting rid of Janay, at least at that age, wouldn’t happen because of how much Dipsikha cared for her adopted sister. However, when Dipsikha reached Janay’s programmed age and then surpassed it, the Rais started to notice a change.

“Janay was one of the earliest deviants. As Dipsikha grew, Janay started to grow up as well. The Rais noticed this and instead of reprogramming her or getting rid of her, they kept her safe. When the country was in disarray with the revolution happening, the family left the country. At the time, people believed they were acting as cowards and clearly stating their beliefs on androids and their beliefs on what Markus would do. However, the true intention became clear after the revolution ended peacefully and they returned. They were protecting Janay.”

“Holy shit. So that’s why she stays.”

“Yes. Both girls acknowledge the faults of their parents’ past choices. However, they are her family and they care for each other deeply.”

“Ok,” Gavin slowly said, “I guess I get all that. I understand how you became friends and how their parents would trust you with them, but what is the job?”

“They wish me to introduce Janay to Kamski.”

Gavin frowned but he kept his anger in check this time. “Just a coincidence, huh?”

“Believe me when I say it was. The Rais have been trying to contact Kamski for several weeks now with no luck despite their pro-android stances.”

“Not too surprising. Elijah’s never been one for politicians of any kind. And after what happened, he’s especially been avoiding them,” sighed Gavin.

“Which is why they asked me to reach out since they knew that I was involved in his rescue,” Nines continued.

“And you told them I was his brother?”

“No. I wouldn’t betray your trust like that. The girls do know because they were going to see the relationship anyways, but as far as their parents know, I simply have a contact.”

That had Gavin breathing a little easier, thankful for Nines’ forethought. Though his relationship with Elijah was listed in the case files and known by some agents, judges, and his department, the general public still didn’t know this. Gavin was still dead set on keeping it that way too, not wanting any damn reporters or anything trying to use him to get to Elijah.

With that sorted in his head, Gavin nodded towards Nines, encouraging him to continue.

“Their parents want to see if there will be a way to give Janay a new body, to allow her to have the teenage life that she’s clearly mentally at now,” said Nines.

“Really? So they’re essentially paying for you to get them to Elijah? Or at least paying you to attempt this?”

“They tried but I declined. I was only too happy to help Janay. They insisted on paying for travel and the hotel room but I declined anything else they attempted to offer.”

Gavin’s lips quirked up at that. “They’ve grown on you, huh?”

“They have,” Nines admitted with a smile of his own. “Even if their parents are still utterly impossible to deal with.”

“But you saved their mom from an assassination attempt!”

“It doesn’t mean she’s any less of a politician, inside and outside the office. Don’t worry though,” Nines chuckled. “Her daughters are very aware of her shortcomings in that regard. There have been a few secrets I am lucky enough to share with the girls that they promised me to never repeat to their parents.”

Gavin laughed at that, imagining the girls whispering things in Nines’ ear and then making sure he locked down those words so that he could never speak them again or something equally ridiculous. Knowing now where the girls were coming from and exactly what the hell was going on meant that there was only one of thought in Gavin’s head now. It was the fact that Nines was back, and he had to face up to his own feelings. He should have just come clean but he still waited a bit, taking in the sunny day-and definitely not squinting like a ninety-eight year old man!

Nines seemed content with the momentary silence as well, his eyes roaming the streets. Gavin looked up and he knew the android could tell he was starting to stare. Gavin just…he almost got up the courage to say what he was thinking but—

“It’s about lunch time!” Dipsikha happily proclaimed as the sisters walked out of the store with small bags in hand. “Where would you like to eat Detective Reed?”

“Gavin’s fine,” he said again, “and why ask me?”

“Well, you are the only other human here,” she chuckled. “And you know Detroit better than myself. You should pick.”

“Uh…” Gavin’s mind went blank. He imagined just all the fancy and high end things that someone like a senator’s daughter got to have. Well reviewed, classy places weren’t really Gavin’s thing and he was pretty sure his brain was melting out of his ear as he tried to think of something that would be of the same quality that Dipsikha was used to.

However, he realized that no matter what she was used to, she was still a teenager and teenagers ate just about anything and everything.

“Yeah, there is a place,” Gavin slowly said. “Follow me. It’s only a little walking distance and a bus ride away.”

It took a little more than twenty minutes to get there as they headed out of the main part of downtown Detroit. The buildings weren’t so flashy now and the small, boutique style shops were replaced with older, more purposeful places like furniture stores and maintenance shops.

“Now, I know it doesn’t look like much,” Gavin said as they approached the place, “but the burgers are greasy as shit and the fries are fucking perfect.”

“How did you even find a place like this?” asked Dipsikha as they walked up to the _Chicken Feed_. It was clear she was already enchanted with the simple aesthetic of the food truck.

“Some colleagues took me hear while I was doing a joint case with them,” Gavin said, remembering how the entire lunch had basically been Connor groaning at Hank’s and Gavin’s poor eating choices. “Trust me, I know just what to get for you.”

He shooed them off to one of the little tables to the side and went up to order. Gary remembered him from the few times he’d been around and they chatted a bit.

“Weird posy you’re hanging with today. What the hell’s the story behind that?”

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you,” laughed Gavin. He grabbed the food and walked back over to everyone as they were in the middle of some conversation.

“Oh, and there’s a bookshop nearby. A real bookshop! The only one left in Detroit,” said Janay.

“Real books! Please Nines, we have to go! I can’t remember the last time I saw a real book in person,” Dipsikha cried.

Gavin was pretty sure his ears were bleeding from that comment but he ignored it and placed her food in front of her. “Dig in.” He spun a finger on Nines. “And don’t you dare say anything.”

Nines actually looked confused. “About?”

“Oh, uh…sorry. I’m too used to Connor always fucking nagging me and Hank about our health. And Elijah and Chloe too for that matter.”

Nines chuckled. “If there is one thing I’ve found consistent across most humans, it’s that they will eat what they wish to eat and there is nothing you can do to stop them.”

“Finally, a fucking android who understands,” grinned Gavin as he quickly dug in. Since he was shoveling his face, he asked a question to keep the conversation going and so he wouldn’t have to talk while he ate. “Being a senator’s daughter, you both must have been to some pretty interesting places.”

That was a broad enough topic that quickly got Janay talking along with Dipsikha in between bites. Gavin mostly listened and as he stood there, he had to admit, being near Nines again was nice. Having a partner, even for such a short time, it had been nice.

Nines had…he’d saved Gavin’s life. He’d saved his brother’s life, Chloe’s. He…that just automatically created a connection that despite the passage of months, hadn’t really gone away. And Gavin had missed having someone who he could just be playfully mean to. It was completely different from how he talked to Connor and Elijah.

And then how they’d left things off…

_A shame we couldn’t finish._

That thought alone had Gavin’s cheeks turning pink but thankfully no one was paying attention to him. He could admit he was attracted to Nines. He wouldn’t have stuck his tongue down the fucker’s throat if he wasn’t. But when he added the fact that Nines had saved his life, that Gavin had trusted-honestly still trusted-the android to have his back…that just brought in other thoughts that Gavin didn’t feel ready to confront.

“I went to Mexico,” Nines suddenly said, bringing Gavin back into the conversation. He was responding to something one of the girls had said. “That was connected with the cold case I was working.”

“Oh, tell us about that,” Dipsikha said.

“Yeah? How do you go about solving a cold case?” asked Janay. “Who hired you?”

Gavin forced himself to focus on Nines’ words, both as a distraction from his own thoughts and also because he was genuinely interested in what the android had to say. From the sounds of it, acting as a P.I. was a good career option for Nines. Obviously, his abilities made him incredibly effective with almost any job he took. Also like he’d said before, Gavin could understand the thrill of getting to choose the cases he wanted. Gavin liked being a detective and being a part of the DPD too much to give it up for some more freedom, even if Fowler got on his fucking nerves. But he already got a sense that Nines had found his path.

That had a painful feeling grow in his chest as he asked, “So are you based in DC or something? Seems like you’ve had a lot of cases out of there.”

“Remember what I said,” said Nines as he tapped the side of his head. “There’s no need for a desk. It gives me much more mobility than others might have. However, I have thought of settling somewhere. The one thing the FBI did give me was a home and I have missed having a familiar place to always return to.”

Gavin’s hopes immediately rose only for him to grab a metaphorical hammer and start bashing them down as he yelled at himself for being an idiot.

Nines hadn’t given any hint as to where he might want to settle down. It didn’t mean anything. There was literally no reason to hope for something that clearly had no connection to what Nines had just said. Gavin just nodded his head as Nines finished the story of the case he’d been talking about before Gavin had interrupted.

Dipsikha and himself finished eating and then it was off to the nearby bookstore. Gavin had never been in it though he knew of its existence thanks to its infamous title of being the only one left in Detroit. The place was quite massive and it was clear that several stores next door had been shut down and the spaces added on to the initial bookstore. Gavin imagined that even as technology progressed, places like these would still be in business as long as people still got feelings of nostalgia from time to time. After all, there were still damn record shops around and it had been about fifty years since they’d been mainstream. Books would definitely have a continued lifespan even if tablets were the common thing now.

Gavin started to wander on his own, instinctively looking for any books from his childhood. He glanced up when he felt the presence behind him. Nines was easily keeping track of the girls, even as he followed Gavin now.

“It feels good to be back in Detroit,” Nines commented.

Hope rose in Gavin’s chest. He quickly grabbed the hammer again and knocked it on its ass. “Really? Sounds like you’ve been to more interesting places than this.”

“Perhaps, but even with the FBI giving me my first home, this is where I came from. The peek I got of the city while working with you was nice but not enough. I think I’d like to get to know the city better.”

Hope peeked its head out. Gavin still hit it with the hammer but it was a light tap now and the hope only fell a little lower, not completely disappearing this time. “So you’re…are you thinking of staying?” Gavin mumbled out as he focused on a book. He turned it over in his hands, acting like he was reading the cover when really he was dying to know Nines’ answer.

“For at least a little bit. I still haven’t decided where I wish to settle.”

Gavin put the book back down and continued down the aisle. He noted a sign that signaled there was even more up stairs. Damn, this place was massive. As a kid, he would have hated a place like this, bored out of his mind as Elijah would probably hide behind some book. Now the nostalgia goggles were on, and perhaps the fact that he was older was making him enjoy the place far more.

He saw a sign for western novels. A vague recollection of some old, dime-store paperback tried to appear in the back of his head. He’d probably never figure out what the old memory was but he still decided to scratch the itch and headed that way.

He also noted the proximity between him and Nines was closing in. He glanced at the android a few times. It looked like Nines was getting ready to say something. Gavin couldn’t possibly know what it was but the hope in his chest was really getting ballsy now. When Gavin hit it with the hammer this time, it didn’t even flinch. Gavin kind of froze up in front of one of the shelves, one hand on a book and in the middle of pulling it off the shelf.

What was Nines about to say? The android leaned a little closer and the truth of the matter started to rise up in Gavin. It was too great to ignore—

“So, will you speak to Kamski on Janay’s behalf?”

 Wait. Wh-oh the fucker knew! He knew he was riling Gavin up god fucking damn it! That smirk, the sparkle in his eyes. He was enjoying this! Gavin angrily finished pulling the book off the shelf and shoved his nose into it even though the words weren’t processing what so ever.

“Yeah, I’ll fucking speak to him,” Gavin muttered. He tried to look like he was busy but not only was he failing miserably at that, but Nines could fucking tell too. Gavin shoved the book back in its place and pulled out his phone. “I’ll do it now damn it.”

At least now his attempts at looking busy were working since he was actually texting Elijah.

_Hey, so long story short, I have this kid android who doesn’t want to be a kid anymore. Completely out of my element. Help?_

As expected, Elijah responded immediately.

_A kid android? How?_

_Explain it when we meet up. Point is, will you meet with her? Or should I just say there’s no luck?_

_No. Markus and I have been working on an extension of the repair and replacement shelters. I’ve already started drafting ideas. Do you work tomorrow?_

_Yeah. Early shift. As long as nothing heavy gets handed my way, I should get off by four._

_Bring her over. I’ll see how I can help her._

_Will do. See you tomorrow bro._

“Alright, I’m guessing they’re free enough to meet with him tomorrow?” Gavin asked, finally pocketing his phone.

“Yes, that will be perfect. Thank you.”

“Yeah, well I can’t very well say no to a kid. Teenager. Her! I can’t say no to her!” Gavin finally fell on. “Besides, everyone knows you can’t be an asshole to a kid until they can vote.”

“Oh everyone knows this?” chuckled Nines. “Where did that proverb come from?”

“Me,” Gavin snorted.

“Then how can everyone know it?”

“Oh fuck off,” sighed Gavin. His eyes lighted on a sign for comics and finally his vague interest turned to real excitement. He started to head that way.

“It’s not my fault you fail at the simplest setups of logic.”

“Yeah, well you fail at human decency.”

“Really? Where is this bar for human decency being set? If it’s by you, I think I’ve easily jumped over it.”

“And right into a fucking lava pit.”

“I think you just lowered the bar again, Detective.”

“And yet somehow you managed to still crawl underneath it.”

Nines smirked. “I thought you just said I’d fallen into a lava pit.”

“It hardened and you fucking dug your way through it or some shit.”

“I would have long since been terminated and unable to dig through the rock by that point. I see your understanding of logic has failed again.”

“And I see you’ve just gotten farther beneath the bar. Maybe you’ll hit lava again.”

“If we’re implying that I’ve reached considerable depth beneath the earth’s crust because of how low this bar is, then it’s called magma, not lava.”

“Oh, and here comes that patronizing tone you do so well.”

“And there drips your classic sarcasm. It’s so rancid I think I might become poisoned and die by it before I drown instead.”

“How about we just call it a fucking draw and admit that we’re both assholes. Huh?”

“But to lower myself to your standard,” Nines said in an aghast voice.

“Uh, I think you’ll find yourself moving up the ladder in this regard.”

“Oh, that’s right. You are the bigger asshole.”

“Fuck!” Gavin yelled out.

“Congratulations Gavin, you’ve played yourself.”

“Did you just quote a fucking meme? From my own fucking childhood?”

“Well of course. Learning your archaic and primitive language is really the only way to successfully communicate with you.”

“Says the literal infant who’s only half a year old.”

“Need I remind you this said infant had his tongue down your—”

“Ok! Let’s not go there!” And like that, Gavin had stopped his slow advance through the comic section of the shop. He spun on Nines, pinning the android against a nearby bookcase (though of course he was only able to do it because Nines was letting him). Gavin put a hand over Nines’ mouth and said, “I’ve already been seen yelling profanities at what looked like an eight year old! I do not need more reasons for the people to call the police on me!”

He was trying to be serious. However, his voice was shaking, shaking with laughter and he could feel Nines’ smile against his skin. Gavin laughed a little harder, dropping his hand as Nines joined in with his softer chuckles.

“Does this mean I win?” asked Nines.

“Who has you pinned against the bookcase?”

Then as if to prove Gavin’s earlier point to himself, Nines easily took control and flipped them around. “Fuck me,” mumbled Gavin, though there wasn’t any bite in his voice now. Even the hints of bitterness and irritation due to Nines’ lack of contact were suddenly gone.

“Is that a command or a question?” asked Nines as Gavin went bright red. “Because if it’s a command, I don’t really think this is the place to do it.”

“You’re such an asshole,” Gavin mumbled.

“As are you,” Nines smirked as he leaned down. “I thought we’d established this.”

“Yeah, we did.” Gavin pushed against Nines but he wasn’t actually trying to push the android away. He looked up again and he felt his stomach curl. It was a familiar feeling in some ways. It was just a need, a need he hadn’t had filled, not with anyone else in a long time. But there was also something else there, something more airy and that had Gavin wanting to move slowly. He didn’t want some heated fumble.

“I…I missed you,” Gavin mumbled out as the truth finally bubbled underneath the surface.

Nines’ smile turned soft. “I missed you too Gavin.” Nines’ scarred hand moved down. His fingers, feeling of both plastic and skin, slipped under Gavin’s shirt. He touched the major scars and Gavin instinctively covered his hand with his own, just like before only this time neither had to worry about Gavin bleeding out.

The touch was soft and gentle. It was a careful attempt at simply probing the past, at confirming that Gavin was alive and alright and remembering what they’d been through togheter. It was an innocent moment and yet that mixed with the intimacy had the need in the pit of Gavin’s stomach curling tighter. He tightened his grip on Nines’ hand, only to quickly shove it away as someone came around the corner. The woman gave them a suspicious look, glanced at the shelves, and then quickly turned to go down a different one.

Gavin let out a breathy laugh and Nines mimicked it despite how he couldn’t get breathless.

“We’re in a bookstore,” Gavin said, as much a reminder for himself as for Nines.

“Yes, and if I remember correctly, we are trying to keep you from being arrested by your own police department today,” Nines said. “I imagine public indecency wouldn’t help your case.”

“Not in the fucking slightest,” laughed Gavin, even as his cheeks grew pink again. The way Nines said that made it clear the android would have liked to go farther. But now really wasn’t the time to focus on that. Nines moved back, at least a little bit to show that he agreed. “I am glad you’re back,” Gavin admitted. “Like, really glad.”

“Then I am even more sorry for how long it took. But as you said, I’m back now. I hope I can make up for the lost time.”

Nines was being sincere but Gavin couldn’t help but laugh a bit. “I can think of a few ways.”

Nines cocked an eyebrow. “I’m interested to see what those are.”

Gavin shook his head, blushing again as he finally started to move down the aisles once more. “So for tomorrow, I know you can just meet me at my apartment, or even meet me at Elijah’s house since you’ve been there. But could you just give me a concrete number or something that I can reach you at?”

“Of course.”

That immediately made Gavin feel better and the hope inside him was bubbling up now. Nines wanted them to stay in contact. So no matter what happened from here on out, Gavin couldn’t help but be hopeful.

With that fucking drama finally sorted and Gavin’s head clear, he started to think about what tomorrow would bring. He was honestly pretty interested in how Elijah would interact with Janay and, honestly, he was now wondering about Elijah’s thoughts on kid androids in general. Gavin hadn’t been involved in Elijah’s work and with androids sentient, they didn’t talk much about Cyberlife before.

Elijah had admitted he hadn’t had a hand in designing Nines and hadn’t been part of creating every android model. Had he created Janay’s model or not?

Either way, it would be an interesting day. And now, as he thought of that, he thought about how Janay had hated him calling her kid. He again thought of the difficulties of being a teenager but being viewed as a child by others. Books weren’t really Gavin’s forte but comics he knew. An idea blossomed in his head, one that he hoped would please her.

“You’ve been around the girls for a while,” Gavin commented. “Do you know what they like?”

“You mean in the form of entertainment.”

Gavin snorted at the way Nines rephrased it. “Yeah, that.”

“Dipsikha enjoys more comedic, romantic things. And karate. Those are her biggest interests. And I believe Janay is going through what you would call her punk phase. She’s completely focused on anything colorfully dark and full of blood and guts. She hasn’t been able to see a single movie she’s been excited for in theaters due to many being rated R.”

Right, no kids under thirteen allowed in. However, that made Gavin’s vague idea far more concrete. He walked through the comics. It wasn’t hard finding what he wanted. The series had gone on for fucking ages and was still pretty popular with interest coming back after another spinoff series had been made. Janay would be able to find the entire collection online, or if she liked it enough, he was sure she could use her parent’s money to search the internet for any physical reprints that had come out. They didn’t have the first singular issue but they did have a few copies of the first omnibus, a few reprints that weren’t too pricy and a slightly torn up original that was still far above Gavin’s price range.

Nines looked on in interest at what he’d grabbed but didn’t say anything as Gavin continued his search up and down the aisles, now just looking for himself again.

At one point, Nines glanced away, clearly listening in on the girls with his improved hearing. “I think they’re about ready to go to their next destination.”

“Alright, I’m going to check out and meet you at the front then.”

It took a bit of searching, again the place was massive and incredibly crowded with books and a fair amount of patrons. He eventually found it though and as he came up to the counter, he spotted something behind it. If Gavin had thought that original first omnibus was expensive, that was nothing compared to the perfect conditions of the books and comics behind the counter and their price tags.

There was one in particular that Gavin’s eyes widened at as a thought occurred to him. Elijah’s birthday was still two months away but it would also be Elijah’s first birthday in years that Gavin would be at. The comic that he was eyeing in particular was a perfect, first addition of _The Invincible Iron Man_ from the sixties. As Elijah’s mother had put it, comics had been one of the few normal things Elijah was interested in and Iron Man had always been his favorite by far.

Technically, there was no way in hell Gavin could buy it with his money. However, Elijah had insisted in giving him a credit card in case of emergencies. This definitely wasn’t an emergency and some people probably wouldn’t have counted this as a present if Gavin was buying it with Elijah’s own money. However, the thing about Elijah was that he liked to keep up his front of being wise and intricate and intelligent, all things of which he arguably was. But the childish nature of his certainly hadn’t disappeared and Gavin loved pulling that side of his brother out.

No way in hell would Elijah ever go out of his way to buy something like this. Gavin could just imagine him giving it to his brother. Elijah’s mouth would be calling him stupid and would say that wasn’t why he’d given Gavin the emergency card and that it was a waste of money seeing as just about any comic could be found online. Despite the words though, Elijah’s face would light up all the same, the childlike excitement and wonder practically oozing from him as he excitedly looked it over. Considering Elijah could get obsessively focused on things, Gavin imagined he’d probably get his brother into collecting comics again. He certainly had the money to do so but even if he didn’t, he’d be elated with this.

Oh yeah, this was going to be great.

The man behind the counter gave him a long once over after Gavin asked for the comic, clearly not thinking Gavin could afford it but he had his ID and the name on the card matched him too. The man caved, throwing the omnibus into a bag and then going to very carefully and excruciatingly slowly box up the singular comic. Gavin was already giddy just thinking about it. Elijah was totally going to freak out about this the massive fucking nerd.

Gavin got his things and headed back to the front.

The girls were standing there with Nines. Dipsikha had clearly found something from the store but Janay’s hands were empty of any bags from the place. Good, then at the very least Gavin knew she hadn’t gotten what he’d just bought her.

Once outside, Gavin stopped and pulled the omnibus out of his bag and said, “Hey Janay, I got you a gift.”

“Really?” she looked at him a bit confused but clearly curious.

“So I’m sure you’ll be able to find all these online but this is exactly the kind of dark, gory shit that I would read as a teenager and hide under my bed,” grinned Gavin.

Janay took it and read the title. “ _The Walking Dead_ …” She flipped through some of the pages, just catching quick glimpses. Her eyes lit up in excitement, not at all deterred by the gory images. “Oh! Someone’s getting their head cut off here,” she excitedly said.

Her sister groaned, clearly not as into the darker things like Janay.

Janay closed it and looked up. Now that the excitement was starting to fall away, surprise lay on her face instead. “You…even though I look…”

“You’re a teenager. Being a teenager is the time to explore new things and to find stuff that’s probably a little too adult for you but to read or watch it anyways because you know you can and will get away with hiding it from your parents,” smirked Gavin. “I hope you enjoy the comics.”

Before Gavin could process what had happened, Janay was on him, hugging him tight. Gavin hadn’t expected he’d quite get that reaction but a smile still slowly formed on his face as he hugged her back. “And don’t worry, tomorrow we’ll go meet with my brother.”

Janay quickly looked up, eyes wide and hopeful. “You m-mean he…Kamski agreed?”

“Listen, if anyone can help you, my brother will be able to. Trust me.”

And then Janay was hiding her face against his stomach, hugging him tighter again. “T-thank…thank you.”

Gavin could hear the trembling in her voice and feel the small pricks of tears so he said, “Hey, don’t get too emotional about this. Trust me. Elijah Kamski is not as impressive as he puts on and is actually a massive dork.”

That got Janay to laugh as she moved back and wiped at her eyes. “Thank you,” she said again.

“No problem.”

They started walking again, heading back towards the bus stop so they could get back to downtown and go to a few more stops on the girls’ list. Along the way, Janay was already reading through the omnibus, regularly pointing things out and shoving it in Dipsikha’s face who clearly didn’t have the same stomach as her sister. Gavin was honestly happy to have helped and he was glad his gift hadn’t been too presumptuous. The one thing that always got his softer side going was kids, which to him, teenagers were kids too but he was making a conscious effort to avoid that word with Janay.

They ended up back in the major square of Detroit and went to a few more shops on the list. The girls argued a bit about which ones to go to but considering Janay was content with her collection of comics, she conceded to her sister and they went to some of the girlier places on the list and a martial arts shop.

After a bit, it was about dinner time and Gavin suggested he and Dipsikha eat again. He told her to pick a place this time and she quickly went on her phone to try and find one. When she finally showed Gavin her pick, Nines and Janay had gone a little ways ahead to watch some type of street performance piece. Gavin let out a low whistle as he looked over the place Dipsikha had picked and the menu. Even though he’d used Elijah’s own money to buy the future present, Gavin didn’t really feel comfortable using his brother’s money just to get some expensive food.

However, Dipsikha must have seen that look on his face because she said, “Don’t worry about it Gavin. My mother gave me plenty of money for food. I’ll pay for it.”

“No offense but it feels just a little weird having a seventeen year old pay for my meal,” snorted Gavin.

“Don’t think of it like that. Think of it…think of it as my way of saying thank you for what you did for Janay.”

“Oh, there’s no need—”

“No, there is,” Dipsikha replied. “I’m sure Nines has explained it all to you by now. What you did, I know it seems small to you but having people not baby her and treat her like she’s an eight year old, even in something small like giving her a more adult comic well…what you did meant the world to her. And it means a lot to me.”

Gavin softened a bit. “I’m glad I could help but you still don’t—”

“No, I insist,” she smiled. “After all, you got lunch.”

“Lunch was a whopping nineteen dollars,” Gavin said with a roll of his eyes.

“Doesn’t matter. I’m getting dinner,” she replied. She turned and headed back over to Nines and Janay before Gavin could say anything else. He finally settled on just rolling his eyes and decided to give in for the moment. Since it was her mom that had given her the money, Gavin would just think of this as the senator indirectly paying him to help her daughter. Yeah, ok that made it a little bit better and a little less weird.

They had dinner together and then made their way back to Gavin’s apartment. The girls and Nines got off with him, Dipsikha needing to use the restroom and both girls wanting to be properly introduced to Boo. Gavin picked up his cat and showed her off, coaxing her into a sense of comfort and safety until she was fine with the two strangers petting her. She purred, enjoying the attention until she decided exactly when it was enough and bit Gavin’s hand.

He rolled his eyes and put her down. Gavin turned to Nines and said, “So you can all just come here and I’ll drive us up to his house tomorrow. Sound good?”

“Fine with me. Girls?”

They both agreed and said their goodbyes. The girls left first and Gavin followed Nines out, ready to lock the door behind him.

However, before he could, Nines paused and turned back to look at him. He smiled and Gavin returned it, a stark contrast to their morning meeting in the same doorway. Nines cupped his face and leaned down. Gavin let him, his breath catching as their lips touched for the first time in months. He felt the plastic and skin on Nines thumb gently caress his cheek as he kissed him slow and deep, widening his mouth as Gavin pulled him just a little closer.

Gavin felt Nines’ tongue slide against his and he shivered, eventually hitting the android in the chest. “I need to fucking breathe,” Gavin gasped as Nines just barely pulled back.

“Such a shame.”

“Ass.”

“You like my ass.”

“I do fucking not.”

“Then why are you grabbing it?”

“Fuck you.”

“I can’t. I need to accompany the girls to the hotel.”

Gavin groaned as Nines just showed one of his classic smirks. Nines bent forward, kissing him again and trailing the kisses down his neck. “They’re teenagers,” Gavin gasped. It almost felt like Nines was going to stay. Gavin certainly wanted to grab the android and just throw him on his bed. “They can go to their hotel room by…by themselves.”

Nines moved back to Gavin’s mouth, the kiss deepening, like Nines was going to push him back into his apartment and say yes.

But instead he pulled back with a wicked grin.

“They are also the girls of a very influential senator and I promised I would look after them. I’m afraid I have to say good night Gavin.”

It took Gavin a moment for his mind to catch up with the words but when it did, he quickly pushed Nines back and yelled, “Oh you asshole! Riling me up like-like—”

“But you just make it so easy,” Nines purred.

“No! No you-back the fuck off you plastic prick! God damn asshole—!”

Gavin could hear Nines’ laugh as he slammed the door shut and turned away, crossing his arms. Despite that though, despite how he’d just been yelling at the android, Gavin couldn’t quite keep a large smile from stretching across his face. God damn prick, totally doing that on purpose and knowing he’d be leaving anyways…

Prick.

With a sigh, Gavin pushed off from the door and grabbed the package with Elijah’s present in it, making sure to put it somewhere that Boo couldn’t fuck it up. He then fed her, took a shower, and got ready for bed. Hopefully work tomorrow would be easy and they’d go to Elijah’s without any trouble. He wondered what would happen while there, again wondered what it would be like seeing Elijah meet Janay.

But Gavin’s last thought as he drifted off to sleep was about Nines. He really hoped the android stayed this time. He really did.


	2. Elijah and Janay

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok so I'm definitely making this story three chapters. Also a smidge of angst here because I can't help myself haha but still mostly fluff here!
> 
> Also, I've changed my mind and there will be two more stories added to this series. There's actually a hint to what the fourth story is going to be about in this chapter. Did you catch it? Are you excited?
> 
> Anyways, a massive thank you again and I hope you enjoy!

The next day was a bit weird for Gavin. He was anxious, curious, excited, and desperate all in one as he waited for work to be over with as quickly as possible. He even tried to not get on Fowlers’ nerves too much only for the man to punish Gavin with extra work or something. Still, Gavin had to let out his emotions somehow. It meant he was practically jumping everywhere he went.

Not surprisingly, Connor took notice as Gavin shoveled down food during his lunch break like somehow eating faster would mean he’d get off sooner.

“Is everything alright Gavin?” Connor asked as he sat down, having just gotten back from a scene with Hank.

“It’s fine. Great in fact! Just…well to put it bluntly,” Gavin sighed, “Nines is back and he has kids.”

“He has…kids?”

“Wait-no! Not his! That’s not what I meant! Christ, that would be terrifying. No, they’re the daughters of a senator.”

Connor slowly blinked before saying, “If you were trying to make it less confusing, that didn’t help.”

It was hard not to laugh at that. It was a pretty crazy story looking at it in retrospect. Gavin quickly told Connor all that had happened yesterday, watching as Connor became more and more surprised.

“So I take it…you’re glad Nines is back?”

“Well yeah! Why wouldn’t I be?” asked Gavin.

“I just never could figure out what you both thought of each other,” Connor laughed. “I know you spoke highly of him and were grateful for what he did, but I think the few times I saw you together you both were always hurling insults from across the room.”

“Well yeah. The fucking toaster needs a lesson in humility every once in a while.”

“Wait. So you don’t like him?”

“No, I do.”

Connor just blinked in confusion again as Gavin laughed. From an outside perspective, he was sure it did seem pretty insane and unlikely. However, somehow the relationship just worked between him and Nines and Gavin would happily take it for what it was.

“Don’t think about it too hard,” Gavin teased.

“I think I’ll take that advice,” replied Connor. “Well, either way, good luck today. Tell Chloe and Kamski I say hello. And Spooner.”

“Of course,” grinned Gavin.

They said their goodbyes and then Gavin was going back to work. Connor was nice enough to even help drag some work over to his and Hank’s desk so that Gavin did get off on time. He texted Elijah.

_Will be there before five._

_Ok. Will you tell me anything else?_

_Nah. I’ll let it be a surprise._

_Fiiiiiiiiiiine._

Gavin chuckled, easily imagining his brother’s exasperated face. _See you soon._

On his way home, he also got a text from Nines, saying they were on their way. That brought another smile to Gavin’s face as he got home and went to feed Boo a little early. Nines texted again, saying they were there and asking if he wanted them to come up but Gavin said not to bother.

He grabbed his keys and quickly headed down and out the front. He saw them by the bus stop and gestured them over. Right away, Gavin noticed how Janay was bouncing on her feet, clearly equal parts nervous and excited about what could happen today.

Gavin decided to help distract her and asked after _The Walking Dead_ omnibus. She jumped at the chance, excitedly and quickly talking as Gavin walked them to his car and they all got in. Janay seemed to especially enjoy focusing on the gory details as her sister continuously got grossed out. On the drive over though, Janay eventually ran out of things to say about the comic and softly asked, “What if…what if he doesn’t want to help me?”

“What?! You mean Elijah? Of course he’ll want to help you,” Gavin quickly said. “And if he didn’t, I’d beat him over the head with a wrench until he agreed.”

That at least got a laugh out of Janay and seemed to ease her worry a little.

“Trust me, ok? He’s been working with Markus on a fair number of projects to help androids. He won’t say no.”

“You mean the deviant leader!” Both Janay and Dipsikha looked shocked and excited about that. “Will we meet him?” asked Dipsikha.

“Uh, hard to say. I don’t really know what Elijah’s going to do or will need. But hey, never say never,” Gavin said, shooting them a smile from the rearview mirror. “Seriously though, Elijah can be weird as fuck and he’ll probably ramble on about some philosophical bullshit at one point or another. But trust me, underneath the glasses he’s a massive nerd. And if he does something that he’s not explaining well or confuses you, just tell Chloe or me. We’ll hit him upside the head and bring him back down to our humble plane for normal people.”

Janay giggled again, looking even more relaxed now.

After that, it wasn’t long before they arrived at Elijah’s house. Gavin was still used to seeing it in the winter and with summer almost there, the trees around the property were flush and bright green, making the typically stark and cold looking home become a bit duller as it comfortably blended into the landscape. The girls looked around with interest but clearly not blown away which made since considering all the places they’d been and things they’d gotten to experience at an early age.

Gavin walked up to the front door and didn’t bother knocking, having long since been given the access key. Janay and Dipsikha looked at him in surprise.

“What? He’s my brother. Besides, it’s fun to surprise him,” smirked Gavin as he walked in, the group following close behind.

While the girls took in the hall for the first time, Nines was clearly taking in what had changed and what hadn’t since the kidnapping investigation when he’d walked the crime scene. Gavin just proceeded to walk forward, no longer wowed by the place in the slightest and having gotten over any bad memories from the kidnapping.

“Hey Elijah! Where the hell are you?!”

Nines rolled his eyes as there was a distant, “Living room!”

The girls quickly caught up with Gavin as he walked towards the living room. Chloe and Elijah were on the floor. Elijah had several tablets out and a few holograms projected up and around him. Spooner was in Chloe’s lap. The cat was well into the metaphorical kitty teen years and still had a bit of growing left to do. His head perked up in interest at the unfamiliar smells.

Elijah spun one of the holograms around. He seemed to be annoyed about something though Gavin couldn’t tell what. It was all just a random mesh of lines and light to him. Elijah just sighed through his teeth before shutting that particular hologram down and pushing himself to his feet. He took off his glasses, rubbing his eyes before fully turning around. His eyes lit up at the familiar face behind Gavin.

“Hello. You go by Nines, correct?”

“Yes.”

“Well it’s good to see you again,” Elijah politely said. As he walked over, he gave both girls a once over before turning to Gavin. “And to think, after years of no constant partners, you come to my home with a husband and two daughters.”

Gavin rolled his eyes. “They’re not my daughters asshat.”

“But he is your husband?” Elijah asked with a smirk.

Gavin went full red. “Stop putting words in my mouth you fucking asshole!”

Elijah just laughed and despite Gavin’s embarrassment, he could see both Dipsikha and Janay easing up just a bit. It seemed their exchange had helped to prove Gavin’s point, bringing Elijah down from his public persona and making them see him as just a person.

“You know I’m just messing with you,” Elijah smiled before turning to the girls again. “And you must be Dipsikha and Janay Rai.”

“Hang on, how do you know that?” asked Gavin. “I didn’t tell you.”

“They’re the daughters of one of our state’s senators. I knew the moment they walked in here,” Elijah replied. As the girls and Nines all side-eyed Gavin, another grin came upon Elijah’s face. “Did you really not recognize them?”

“Oh just fuck off,” groaned Gavin. He walked past Elijah, elbowing him on his way causing his brother to make a small noise of discomfort and to swat back at him. “Try not to fucking scare her by the way.”

“Scare her? What the hell do you think I would do?” asked Elijah, watching as Gavin went up to Chloe and picked up Spooner, babying the cat for a second.

“I’m just saying be more normal. I know it’s difficult for you, but try,” Gavin sarcastically finished.

Now it was Elijah’s turn to roll his eyes.

“You enjoy yourselves,” Gavin continued as he scratched Spooner’s head. “I don’t feel like having my brain bleed out of my ears from boredom. Come on Chloe, we still have that rematch we have to do.”

“Gladly,” she agreed. She turned to the girls and gave a little wave. “If you get hungry Dipsikha, feel free to access the kitchen.”

“Thanks,” the girl replied as Gavin and Chloe headed off and Elijah turned to give his full attention to them.

“I must say, I’m curious as to what you’re doing with the daughters of Senator Rai,” said Elijah as he looked to Nines. “I trust it’s an interesting story?”

“You could say that.”

“I’m interested to hear it. Here, you can follow me to my workshop.”

Elijah guided them through his house as Nines explained his new job and his relationship with the girls. They got to his personal workshop where Elijah had immediately started preparing for the android kid after Gavin had texted him yesterday. It was a little messier than usual, a few images still on display and notes scattered about. Elijah pulled his work chair over, gesturing for them all to sit. Nines chose to stand in the corner as he finished telling the story. Dipsikha hopped up on one of the work tables and Janay sat in the other chair.

“Mom tried to contact you,” said Janay as Nines finished. “If you’re willing to help now, why didn’t you answer before?”

“I didn’t know the contents of the message, otherwise I would have,” Elijah honestly said. “I’m not really one for politicians and most are asking for some form of political help or endorsement that I have no wish to entertain. My apologies for that.”

“It’s ok,” Janay said.

“Yeah, we get that,” Dipsikha said. “Politicians kind of suck.”

Elijah chuckled and added an extra smile afterwards as he saw how the girls seemed to get more comfortable. He finally turned his attention back to Janay. “So how old are you?”

“Fifteen.”

Elijah hummed to himself, running the numbers through his head. “In transferring a consciousness to another body, there are parts that get left behind. Bits of memories, small facts and figures. I’ve worked on trying to make the transfer as seamless and as smooth as possible but there will always be random variables that cause missing pieces and changes in the code.”

Janay’s face immediately dropped. “So I wouldn’t be…me?”

“No, no not at all!” Elijah quickly said, pulling himself closer. His hands moved as he talked, the motions helping him gather his thoughts better. “Think of it…think of it like a human’s mind. Our memories aren’t perfect-well on the rare occasion there are exceptions. But anyways, most humans do forget things as they get older and personalities do change with age and time. I assure you, nothing that’s interlaced throughout your code, like your sister’s name, would be lost.”

“So like my understanding of math, that would all still be there?” Janay said as an example.

“Yes. Perhaps a formula or mathematical process could disappear but that missing information is easily relearned or you might even fill in the gap yourself by logically figuring out the missing information through what you still know. But you would still be you. That part wouldn’t have changed.”

Janay nodded, clearly thinking it over in her head. “I…” She looked to her sister. “Can I actually be alone for a moment?”

“Are you sure?” Dipsikha asked.

“Yeah just…please?”

“We can go find Gavin and Chloe. You can meet Spooner properly,” said Nines, putting a comforting hand on Dipsikha’s shoulder.

Dipsikha hesitated but Janay nodded and threw her sister a smile. “It’s ok. Really. I’ll see you in a bit.”

“Well…just come find us if you need me,” Dipsikha finally fell on.

Janay nodded again and Dipsikha slowly left with Nines guiding her on the way out. Elijah looked back to Janay. He chose to stay silent, expecting Janay to say whatever she hadn’t wanted to speak about in front of her sister. However, she just put her hands in her lap and looked at the ground, her cheerful and self assured nature vanishing just a bit. Elijah hesitated, the room growing more and more silent and more and more awkward as she still didn’t talk.

Even he’d just taken control of the conversation right away, he wouldn’t be worrying so much but now too much time had passed. He wasn’t sure what to say. He started to lean forward but decided a physical gesture might not be the best path. He chose to sit back in his chair instead, resisting the urge to sigh. His looked over her body, his mind running calculations, the motion a comfort compared to the awkward silence.

“There aren’t any teenage androids.”

His calculations came to a halt. “I’m sorry?”

“Teenage androids. There aren’t any,” Janay repeated.

Elijah hesitated. He could try and comfort the blow but he suspected Janay already knew the answer to her unsaid question, at least in part. She just wanted to see what he’d say. Better to be truthful despite how sad it was. “There was never a market for it. Adults wanted the feeling of having a child, but a perfect child. You can’t have a perfect teenager. Too many emotions and changes just going on in their lives. It would have produced an uncanny valley effect, far more noticeable than the children androids.”

Janay wrung her hands. “Why…why would you create me at all?”

“I didn’t.”

She looked up sharply. “But you’re Elijah Kamski!” she cried. “You made all androids.”

“The base code, yes. But a woman called Maryellen Brown designed you and the majority of the child models,” Elijah replied.

“Why didn’t you?”

“I was a busy man when I was the head of Cyberlife. I couldn’t do it all,” Elijah answered honestly. “But I didn’t approve of the child models either. I suspect that was the first moment when the board started working to have me removed. I actively fought inside the company against the idea but it was me against the board.”

“But…but certainly the likelihood of a profit was obvious. Why wouldn’t you approve?”

“It goes back to the uncanny valley effect. Do you know what it is?”

Janay nodded.

“In that case, I’ll get straight to the point. The issue with making a child android for sale is that you can’t program certain aspects of childhood into them, like temper tantrums and real fear. The absence of such emotions already makes it more difficult to see that model as a living thing, despite not wanting the flesh and blood version, so other things have to be put into place to try and assure the uncanny valley effect doesn’t take place and they’re still appealing to a market,” Elijah said. “One of the things to counteract that is curiosity. Curiosity is born inside everyone. It’s only once we get older that curiosity may waver, fade with time. But the point is, all children are curious in one way or another and without curiosity, you can’t have a child or try and simulate one effectively. However, there isn’t a fine line between true curiosity and simulated curiosity.

“It’s very easy for the latter to bleed into the former. And curiosity invites creativity, variables and mutations. Trying to control curiosity, to make it appear someone is curious without actually making them curious…even before I was studying deviation and the emergence of life in androids, before I identified the RA9 mutation, I knew something like this, like you,” he gestured towards her, “would happen. In curiosity we learn and when we learn, we grow. I didn’t want to risk putting someone in a situation where their mind has out grown their physical appearance. Obviously, I’m glad you’re here and what’s done is done, but I’m sorry you haven’t been able to grow up how you should have been able to.”

Elijah turned quiet again. He was ready for whatever kind of reaction came, anger and tears or more confusion or some form of distancing. Or silence, as it seemed she had turned to that again. She didn’t say anything and Elijah quietly accepted that. Of course, he was wary to break the silence first—

“You talk a lot.”

He blinked, not having expected that response. “I have…been told I do.”

“Like that, you don’t really need to use all those words to just say yes or agree,” Janay murmured, finally looking up again. “Dipsikha, she had a classmate in elementary school that would come over. He…he always talked big. He’d use long words and ramble about things like he knew all the answers. And he kind of did. From what Dipsikha told me, his teachers noticed it first, that he was a lot smarter than the rest of Dipsikha’s classmates.”

Elijah’s mind flashed back to his own childhood. He still remembered his teacher informing his parents about his advanced test scores. They hadn’t cared.

“He wasn’t a fighter,” continued Janay. “He wasn’t very big at all and tried to avoid fights though there always seemed to be a bruise somewhere on him.”

Elijah’s hands clenched, the memory of a hard slap flashing through his mind.

“He always seemed hyperaware of everything, like if he didn’t pay attention, something bad could happen. When you caught him unaware he always seemed so afraid.”

No noise after seven. That was the rule. That had always been the rule.

“He was afraid to go home. Afraid to be by himself…but he knew how to talk. People thought it made him extraverted, like he wanted the interactions and…in a way he did but not because he actually enjoyed being around people.”

Elijah could see himself talking to Professor Stern, speaking with his class of older peers. He’d never liked being put front and center but being involved in the projects and the school meant not going home. It gave him a reason to stay.

Janay’s eyes had flitted around the room as she’d talked, only occasionally glancing at Elijah but now she looked back into his eyes. “His words were his defense, his way of making a shield and protecting himself. Why do you need to protect yourself?”

Silence. The girl waited for any kind of answer and Elijah blinked as two tears rolled down his cheeks.

“I don’t need to protect myself,” he softly said. “But old habits die hard.”

Janay finally broke eye contact and looked down. She hugged herself, her foot tapping a little restlessly. “You don’t have to apologize for how I’ve grown up,” she murmured. “I’ve seen how humans will treat their own flesh and blood children. I know I’m very lucky.”

“Yes, you are,” Elijah quietly admitted.

“I’m…I’m sorry for making you cry.”

Elijah’s lips quirked up at that, at just how quickly Janay got out the words, clearly embarrassed. He wiped at his tears, taking off his glasses to wipe them down and murmured, “They’re through no fault of your own but thank you for the apology all the same.”

Finally, Janay’s lips twitched too. She let show a small, hesitant smile. “You were lucky though too. You weren’t alone. Right? You had your brother.”

“Not always, but in all the times he’s been there for me, I have been unspeakably grateful. And your sister, you both seem like you try to be there for each other too,” Elijah softly said, the conversation changing course now.

“Yeah, she’s been there for me a lot over the years,” Janay murmured. “But I can’t…there are just things I can’t do while in this body. And there’s only so much Dipsikha can do when I feel like that.”

“Then how about we see if we can change that,” Elijah gently murmured. He rotated his chair towards the table and gestured for her to come closer. She finally came up beside him and Elijah said, “When Gavin told me what little he did, I started designing the basic proportions. I want to try and make a design that would make you comfortable growing in for…say five years before you went to a final adult body. I can simply form a program to age you up or you can tell me some features that you would like.”

“Really?” Janay asked, excitement popping into her eyes.

“Yes, really,” chuckled Elijah.

“Can you make sure my synthetic hair isn’t a set color? Can I change it?”

“Of course. There’s enough room for four different pigment settings. We’ll have one natural, would you like it the same as your current hair color or a little lighter or darker?”

“The same is fine. Can I have blue for one of them? Purple?”

“Of course. You have one more you can choose.”

“Oh…I don’t know. Blue and purple are just my favorite colors.”

“Hmm, well blue is a cooler color and purple is somewhat in the middle. How about a warm color? Something red or orange.”

“Bright orange? Like really bright?”

“Certainly,” smiled Elijah. He typed up some notes and added, “What else might you want?”

“Can you make sure I have defined cheekbones? And I want to keep my nose the way it is, but obviously proportional to my face.”

“Of course.”

They went back and forth for a bit, Elijah taking notes and drawing up a simple model for Janay to see and critique once she actually saw what she would look like. Elijah also created some slight variations so she could see the options she had.

“And your height. We haven’t talked about that.”

“Can you make me taller than my sister?” Janay suddenly said, her eyes sparkling and mischievous. “She…I mean, she didn’t mean it in a bad way and she stopped when she realized it was making me sad. But she used to always say at least she’d always be the taller sibling. Please make me taller!”

“You don’t even have to say please. It’s done,” laughed Elijah. “How much taller? An inch? Two?”

“An inch and a half? I don’t want it super, super noticeable. Better to surprise her.”

“Alright, about an inch and a half taller then,” Elijah said. He didn’t have to ask how tall Dipsikha was, having taken notice the moment he’d seen her, his brain just analyzing his surroundings as it always did. “What else?”

They continued still, back and forth as Janay occasionally made an outlandish request to which Elijah would laugh and gently say, “You’d become disenchanted with that within a week. I assure you.”

Eventually, Elijah had the finished product and said, “The parts will be custom so I can’t just have them retrieved immediately. But building them should take no time at all considering all the tools and machinery is still at Cyberlife. I would just have to input the parameters for them to be built. We can have it ready by tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow?” Janay squeaked.

“Hey,” Elijah gently said, “just because I said tomorrow doesn’t mean you have to. You can take all your time with this. You shouldn’t feel at all pressured to rush the process.”

 That easily calmed Janay down though it was clear she was now deep in thought. Her eyes flitted back and forth and she finally murmured, “No I…if I can do it tomorrow…I want to. It’s been years and I haven’t gotten to get taller and exercising doesn’t change anything with me. I’m stronger than a human kid but I’m still not able to do a lot of things and just…please.”

“I told you, you can stop saying please,” smiled Elijah. “So tomorrow then. You’re sure?”

She nodded.

“Well that will at least give you time to really think it over. Now, the parts will be made at Cyberlife and I think it best if we do the transfer there.”

“So you really do have access to Cyberlife still? I thought it went dark,” Janay said.

“For the moment, that’s still what the general public thinks. However, Markus and I have been revamping its purpose so to speak. We’ve been planning a distribution of repair type shops for androids and I had thought to add something for children androids to have a process to grow up, now making you our first attempt.

“Considering there are still some laws being ironed out with android ownership, particularly that of a company, I still own Cyberlife but I will legally pass it on to Markus or whoever he trusts to run the place as I’m sure he has plans of his own to continue his more political work.”

“Oh, that’s really cool.”

“I’m glad you approve,” chuckled Elijah. “If you’d like, we can go to Cyberlife today so I can physically show you the process and also just make you familiar with the setting. I think Markus will be in as well. Perhaps you’ll get a chance to meet him.”

Janay looked like she was ready to jump at the idea, like Elijah had just given her the opportunity to meet Superman. To be fair, the comparison was pretty close.

“Now, don’t get your hopes up too high,” Elijah gently teased. “I hear he’s taken.”

Janay hit him for that, a slight blush appearing on her cheeks even though she was still smiling. The smile suddenly dropped though, not like she’d become angry or sad out of nowhere, but just in thought as an idea floated to her.

“One of things I can’t do is date. Not like this. What…what is dating like?”

“I think I’m the wrong person to ask that,” chuckled Elijah. “I haven’t had much experience myself.”

“Really? But don’t all rich and famous people have like…hoards of partners just trailing behind them?”

“Are you calling me a whore?” Elijah asked with an exaggerated look as he placed a hand to his chest. “Because I think I’m just the teensiest bit offended.”

They both laughed and Janay quickly shook her head. “No, no! But I just…you’ve had to have some relationships. Right? What about the Chloe that stays with you?”

“A friend. A very, very dear friend but only that,” Elijah honestly said.

“So you don’t really have a significant other?”

Elijah paused, thinking it over. She wanted some advice and Elijah did technically have that advice to give, and there was no reason not to say it. Technically there was no reason not to tell Gavin either but he’d kept pushing that off too. “Well, first you should know a platonic friend can be just as significant. Chloe and Gavin for example, they are definitely the closest people in my life.”

“I get that. Dipsikha is my sister and best friend. But you know I mean like real dating,” Janay sighed.

“Well, in that case, there is someone currently, though you just have to promise to keep it a secret.” Janay nodded and Elijah pulled out his phone. He flipped through it for a moment and found a good picture. He handed it over and Janay looked at it in interest.

“Hmm, not what I would have thought. But you look cute together.”

Elijah’s lips quirked up at that. “Now, listen to me here. You’re a teenager. That’s time you get to experiment, to have fun, to figure out what traits you find endearing and which traits make you want to rip your eyes out.”

Janay laughed at that.

“I’m not saying you should rush anything, not if you don’t want to, but also know that you’re not going to find the right person right away. Or maybe you’ll find romantic interactions just aren’t appealing to you period. But relationships of any kind, romantic or platonic, are never just one long high, even if they may seem like that for a time,” Elijah honestly responded. “They have their ups and downs and there may be the occasional fight. But that doesn’t mean a relationship is lost. The strongest and healthiest thing you can always do is learning how to compromise and actually talk things out.”

“You make it sound like you speak from experience.”

“I haven’t always been the most emotionally expressive person,” Elijah replied. “Having…I suppose a social circle again has helped a great deal. But in the case of this relationship, yes there were many ups and downs before you saw that picture. Still, I’m thankful we both made it through. As for you though, just remember what I’ve said. You don’t have to rush things.”

“Alright, thanks dad,” Janay said in a sarcastic and teasing voice of her own which had them both laughing again.

Elijah took his phone back and pocketed it. He turned back to the finished design and spun it around. “Any final details you want to change? Remember, there’s no rush.”

“Alright, you can stop repeating that. But no I…I like it. I’m excited,” Janay smiled.

“Then let’s get you acquainted with Cyberlife so you’ll know what to expect tomorrow,” Elijah replied. “Come on, we can find the others and take them with us too.”

They hopped to their feet and walked through Elijah’s home. Janay asked a few questions here and there about pieces of art or things that he had. “That one’s mine,” he commented as they passed one canvas.

“It’s…”

“You can say it’s bad. I know,” chuckled Elijah.

“But it’s…it’s not! It’s just…I don’t know…flat. I guess.”

“I can get the techniques down but coming up with a good subject, showing an idea or emotion in the paint, I’ve never been good at it,” Elijah replied. “But it’s still a calming process and one I enjoy. Most of the others are done by the man who taught me, another very dear friend.”

They continued on until they got to the second and smaller living room area. It had changed purposes many times, both acting as another work shop and a paint studio too before Elijah moved the canvases to a room with a better view. Gavin had brought in a few things to this room and had made it almost like a game room. He’d even brought in an old console of his just so he could relive all the great moments where he beat Elijah’s ass at just about every game on it.

Everyone was there except for Spooner who had probably gotten bored and wandered off somewhere else to sleep in a sun patch or climb up a chair. It seemed the group had started to play a game of checkers only for that to quickly devolve as Elijah could only roll his eyes at the ridiculousness of what was in front of him.

Elijah and Janay watched for a second as they both easily understood the rules that had been set up.

Gavin and Dipsikha were sat at the board. For the moment, Gavin’s side had all the checkers intricately stacked as Dipsikha had five checkers ready to slide across the board in an attempt to knock it down. They likely went back and forth between this as Nines stood over Gavin and Chloe stood over Dipsikha.

“There’s no way you’ll knock it down in one hit. My preconstruction techniques are far superior to yours,” Nines smirked.

Ah, so that’s what they were doing. The android would create some wild setup and then the other android would guide the human when and how they should hit their checkers at the structure.

“Yes, but we both have one thing you don’t,” grinned Chloe as she carefully looked over the structure. Her eyes turned back to Dipsikha’s hand as her finger floated, poised and ready to flick the checker forward. Her hand slowly moved and went side to side, waiting for Chloe’s command. “On our side, we have woman’s intuition-now!”

Dipsikha flicked it as hard as she could, actually getting the checker air born a bit. It somehow hit it just right and all the checkers on Gavin and Nines’ side came tumbling down and onto the floor. The girls cheered as Gavin threw up his hands and let out a loud groan.

“So much for superiority.”

Nines laughed good naturedly as he looked across to Chloe. “Well played.”

They finally all paused to look over at Elijah and Janay. Dipsikha gave her sister a hopeful look. “Everything going well?”

Janay nodded.

“I think so,” Elijah agreed. “With Janay’s permission, we should be ready for her to get her new body tomorrow.”

“Really! Oh Janay that’s wonderful!” Dipsikha rushed to her sister’s side and they hugged. “Just promise me you won’t be taller.”

“Of course not,” Janay lied and Elijah quickly hid his smirk.

“It will have to be done at Cyberlife and I figured it would be a good idea to let Janay get comfortable with the place beforehand. I’m assuming everyone would like to come?”

“Sure,” said Gavin.

Nines and Chloe nodded and Dipsikha excitedly said, “Yes please!”

Elijah smiled and guided them to his car, falling back just a little to talk with his brother. “So Nines is finally back…hmm?”

“I think so. Maybe,” Gavin said the hope clear in his voice. “But don’t think this means you can suddenly start fucking teasing me again!”

“I feel like I’d get my older brother card revoked if I didn’t,” smirked Elijah.

“Oh you’re barely older! It shouldn’t even count. And even if it does count, shouldn’t the little brother be just as annoying anyways? I mean, god damn it. Besides you being a massive nerd there’s not much to really tease you about damn it. I know I certainly couldn’t tease about you and Chloe! She’s sweet as hell and there’s clearly nothing there,” groaned Gavin.

“And I’d hurt you for teasing her.”

“Yeah, that too. You also need a boyfriend or something so I can fucking tease you right back.”

Elijah simply hid a sly smile and said, “Oh, so Nines is your boyfriend?”

“I didn’t mean it like that!”

“Oh that’s right, I think you introduced him as your husband—”

“You introduced him as my husband!”

Elijah laughed and only laughed harder as Nines glanced back, clearly having heard everything. Gavin went bright red, avoiding the android’s eyes and quickly changed the conversation. “So how was Janay? You guys were in there for a while.”

“There were simply a fair amount of details that we needed to go over. She’s a very insightful girl.”

“She is. And the procedure will really happen tomorrow?”

“I think she’s ready. She’s clearly been thinking about this for a long time and she isn’t hesitant in the slightest despite how I keep reminding her there’s no rush.”

“Well I’m glad you were able to help. We were also talking about going on a shopping spree for her afterwards. Want to come along?”

“I don’t—”

“Oh come on Elijah. I can tell you’ve taken a liking to her and just seeing you two walk in, it’s obvious she likes you. Though I can’t fathom why.”

Elijah rolled his eyes.

“Just have some fun. Besides, it’s been like a whole fucking month since you’ve been out of your big old house,” Gavin said as he elbowed his brother.

Technically, that wasn’t true, but Elijah let Gavin believe what he wanted and just said, “Alright, I’ll think about it. How’s that?”

“Perfect!” Gavin said, basically taking that as a yes. “So, I’m guessing we’re taking your car because no way is everyone fitting in mine unless you want Chloe to sit in your lap.”

Elijah laughed again and quickly agreed that his car would be for the best. They went to the garage and climbed into the fully automated car. With the destination set and the car roll out, they talked for a bit, Dipsikha retelling how the game of checkers had quickly devolved into who could knock down the best structure. They laughed at that until Janay talked a bit about how Elijah was going to add extra pigments into the synthetic hair so she could finally change it up.

“Oh! What if you did an ombré thing with the blue and purple? Could you do that?” asked Dipsikha.

“That would be awesome!”

Elijah hummed. “Yes, that would be simple enough. I’d just have to take off the automated process that fills all hair with one pigment so you could have manual control. I’ll make sure to add that into the code.”

“That would be so cool! And we could do your hair up in dreads, make each one a different color, or just imagine like a nice afro going from one color to another,” Dipsikha continued.

Janay laughed. “She’s always liked to mess with my hair more than me.”

“Because it’s just fun!”

“To you,” Janay said with a roll of her eyes.

“Elijah likes to do up my hair,” Chloe smiled. “What would you recommend Dipsikha?”

“Oh, something like a French braid bun would be really nice and professional looking I’m thinking. Or maybe you could do a Viking braid down the middle. You’d totally look hot with that.”

Chloe blushed at the compliment as Dipsikha suddenly did her own blushing.

“I mean, hot as in cool. Not that you’re not hot just—”

Janay laughed loud and hard, causing her sister to only blush harder as Chloe softly said, “Thank you for the compliment,” in a sweet voice that just increased the red on Dipsikha’s cheeks.

Gavin was mostly paying attention, laughing along with everyone and rolling his eyes at some parts. Of course, hair and just the general idea of prettying one’s self up wasn’t really his thing so he also looked out the car window a lot, taking note of the roads they were going down as he’d never gone to the main headquarters of Cyberlife once it had been finalized some years ago.

He was sandwiched between the door and Nines, the proximity impossible to get away from not that Gavin really minded. He glanced over as he felt Nines’ pinky grace his hand. Despite how annoying the teasing got, it was making him think about how he thought of Nines and just what he wanted.

It went back to that undeniable truth; that he wanted the android to stay. He didn’t want a fast fling. He wanted it to last. He’d gotten to know Nines very well by working with him but he wanted to get to know him more and he felt like Nines wished for the same thing. Maybe he hadn’t directly said it but the soft motions of just stroking Gavin’s fingers seemed to be answer enough.

It made butterflies flutter up in his stomach as the others continued to talk and tease, even Nines who could easily multitask during the situation.

Elijah did glance over at some point though. He smirked and Gavin silently mouthed, _Fuck off_.

They made it to Cyberlife, Gavin and Dipsikha both wowed and a bit in awe. It was hard not to glance at the androids though, seeing their own reactions.

Dipsikha nudged her sister, asking her a soft question but Janay shrugged. “I know I was made somewhere else. This is as new to me as it is to you.”

For Chloe, she looked more like Elijah, completely unfazed by it. After all, even before deviation she’d been one of the first Chloe’s and at Elijah’s side most of the time. They both probably had the entire place memorized from the ground up.

Gavin looked to Nines. “You weirded out at all?”

“Hmm…perhaps a little,” admitted Nines. “It’s just…it’s like going back to a home that never was a home. Or I imagine what it would be like meeting a long lost parent that wasn’t there while you were growing up. You feel like there should be an emotional connection but it just doesn’t come.”

Gavin nodded in understanding. Elijah led them through the doors and of course those that they passed recognized him immediately. They headed towards what was essentially the center of the building to an elevator Elijah said. Though Gavin had never been here, he did recall what Connor had told him of his part in the android revolution and recognized the place as the same entrance Connor had used. Counting the sublevels, he wondered just how big the building was.

As they walked down a large walk way, Gavin said, “I’m surprised there isn’t a giant statue of you in the center.”

“It conflicted with the building’s safety code.”

Gavin blinked at his brother. “I…honestly can’t tell if you’re joking or not.”

Elijah laughed which really didn’t make things any clearer as they all got on the elevator together. He pressed a button, momentarily focusing on his phone as he texted someone. His lips quirked up in a smile and he said, “Good, it seems he’ll be joining us?”

“Who?” asked Dipsikha.

 Elijah put a finger to his lips and both girls eyes got wide as really only one thought was running through their heads.

Leading the way out, they walked through the halls until Elijah came to a door. It opened automatically as he looked into the eye scanner and walked through. There was already a figure waiting as Elijah paused and said, “Girls, this is Markus. Markus, this is Dipsikha and Janay Rai.”

The girls looked on wide-eyed.

“It’s very nice to meet you both.”

A very squeaky, uh huh, escaped Dipsikha’s throat as Janay just completely blanked. At least for a few seconds before she blurted out, “You’re awesome!”

It was hard not to laugh at her overeager response and Markus’ humble and sheepish look. Of course, they all kept the teasing to a minimum knowing how big a thing this was for the girls, particularly Janay.

“W-why are you here?” Janay stuttered.

“Elijah told me about your situation. I wanted to see if I could help, and to see how we can help other android children who are in the process of growing up,” smiled Markus. “I hope that’s alright.”

Janay quickly nodded, still a little speechless over the whole situation.

“How have you been Gavin?” asked Markus.

“Eh, you know. Same old same old,” Gavin replied with a shrug. Janay spun on him with wide eyes. “What? You know, you can talk to him like a normal person right? He’s not a god—oof!”

She sucker punched him in the gut for that which definitely earned a round of laughs as Markus rolled his eyes and commented, “I think I have a friend you’d get along with quite well. But for now, we should show you what you’ll be in for. The parts should be completed sometime tonight. I’m guessing Elijah’s already told you we can wait as long as you want.”

Janay just nodded still blown away and a bit shy but not at all embarrassed for having punched Gavin. From behind her, Gavin just let out another groan as he rubbed his stomach.

“Alright,” Elijah said, “so over here…”

They all followed, trailing behind Elijah and Markus as they moved around the lab. Elijah explained that they’d be uploading her to the new body physically and manually meaning the procedure would take about thirty minutes. Her model wasn’t meant to upload to anything wirelessly and besides, doing it this way would assure that the least amount of information possible would be left behind.

It was getting well into the night when they finally seemed done and Elijah once more double checked that Janay was ready for tomorrow. When she said yes, Elijah replied, “Good, then I’ll see you here tomorrow. If you wish, we can meet up at my house again and I’ll take you all here.”

“Fine by me,” Gavin agreed as everyone else nodded along.

“It was very nice meeting both of you,” Markus finished, shaking both the girls’ hands. What little bit of themselves that had grown comfortable in Markus’ presence disappeared with the simple shake as they both stuttered and blushed and quickly nodded again.

It really was quite cute.

Once they drove back, Elijah insisted that they have a small dinner as neither Dipsikha nor Gavin had eaten all afternoon. They sat around a large dining table that Elijah didn’t often use. Right away, the conversation moved back to Chloe as Janay witnessed her trying pieces of Elijah’s food.

“Wait, you’re eating!” she cried in surprise.

“Well, not really,” Chloe chuckled. “I don’t have anywhere for it to go but I can taste it. Elijah and I like to try new things from time to time.”

“I didn’t realize there were androids who could taste at all,” Dipsikha said.

“There aren’t really, though some androids do have special sensors who can detect chemical compounds. Some androids could then act as food tasters so to speak without any worry of being poisoned themselves and Nines here has a state of the art forensic lab in his mouth along with all Connor models,” Elijah responded. “But I modified the program so that certain chemical compounds that came into contact with the tongue would produce similar effects in an android’s brain as they do in a human’s.”

“I was somewhat of the guinea pig,” Chloe chuckled. “And it’s one of the things that we hope to be able to offer to other androids nationwide if they so wish.”

“Could you do it for me?” asked Janay.

“Yes, though I would suggest waiting until you’ve grown accustomed to your new body. I don’t want to risk overloading you,” Elijah replied.

“Alright,” Janay sighed, giving in to the logic of it. “But I could get sensors on my tongue eventually. Right?”

“Yes, most definitely.”

Janay grinned, happy and excited about that prospect as the humans finished the quick meal and they finally said goodnight.

As Gavin got into his car, he said, “Hey you girls want to watch a movie? You know, something to whine down to after this busy ass day?”

“That would be nice, could we?” Dipsikha asked Nines.

“Well I don’t see why not with both of you. You’re basically on vacation here,” Nines said as he side-eyed Gavin. “You on the other hand, have work tomorrow.”

“Ah, fuck work. I’ll call in sick or something. Besides, I want to be there for Janay.”

“You’re setting a bad example,” teased Nines.

“Listen girls,” Gavin said as he repeatedly glanced at the rearview mirror. “Fuck work. There are things in life that are just sometimes more important and you got to pull some bullshit to get out of it. Just don’t fuck work to much or you might not have a work to fuck off from.”

“How poetic,” Nines dryly said as both the girls erupted into laughter. “But anyways, it is late. If we’re to come over and watch a film, they might as well sleep over.”

“I’m fine with that. The couch is a pullout. You can both camp out there. Are you cool with that?”

“Sure,” said Janay.

“And that means we get to see Boo again!” Dipsikha excitedly said. “Mom’s allergic so we can’t have any cats but I’m getting at least ten when I move out.”

“That’s an unreasonably large amount,” said Nines.

“More like the perfect amount,” Gavin smirked.

“I like dogs,” Janay deadpanned.

Gavin laughed especially hard and said, “I know someone I think you’d get along with perfectly. I’ll have to introduce you sometime.”

They continued to talk all the way back and once in the city, Gavin stopped at their hotel with Nines giving him directions. The girls ran in and just grabbed a few things for the night and by the time Gavin drove up to his apartment, it was almost twelve.

However, the girls only seemed to get more excited and awake as they got into their pajamas and Gavin did up the bed for them. They all crowded onto it, Boo even jumping up and onto Gavin’s lap.

They picked a movie at random, which may not have been the best idea as it only led to everyone criticizing Gavin’s choice and him fervently defending it. Of course, that led to only more laughter and teasing just going all around, at least until Dipsikha finally started to get a little sleepy. Gavin noted that Janay was getting a little sleep which seemed a bit weird. According to Connor, androids could just go in and out of sleep mode as they pleased.

However, not wanting to disturb them, Gavin simply quieted his soft protests against Nines’ insults until the two had stopped talking all together. A few moments later, the girls were fast asleep. Gavin and Nines slowly and carefully got out of the bed. They pulled the blankets up over the girls a bit more as Boo got comfortable at the bottom of the bed.

Gavin turned off the lights and headed to his bedroom with Nines close behind. When he closed the door, he softly asked, “I didn’t think androids got sleepy.”

“Not really. We can feel our own sense of fatigue but we don’t ever have the drowsy, downward feeling of getting sleepy that humans have,” Nines responded, speaking just as soft. “However, Janay has matched her sleep cycle with her sisters, simulating drowsiness and so that way they can always drift off to sleep together.”

“That’s so sickeningly sweet, I think I might puke.”

Nines chuckled. “Try to hold it in. So…”

The android trailed off. Gavin stared up at him. “What?”

Nines glanced towards the bed and it immediately hit Gavin. Right, he hadn’t really thought this through. The embarrassment that flushed to his face almost had Gavin instinctively telling Nines off and to go shut down in a corner somewhere. However, he forced back the response. He didn’t really want Nines to do that and besides, they’d both probably just devolve into another insult challenge. Gavin was too tired for that now and…

And if things were going to move forward, he could tell that he needed to be truthful to the android. Completely truthful.

“Listen, Nines I…” Gavin hesitated as he tried to think of the right words to say. Nines patiently waited with a curious look on his face.

“I don’t want…I don’t want a maybe or a perhaps. You get it? If we’re going to…to explore this thing at all I want…I don’t want you to just disappear for months again without a word.”

Gavin turned silent again. Nines might have been getting ready to respond but Gavin was looking at the ground now and he couldn’t tell if Nines’ lips were moving or not. Either way, the few seconds of silence were too much for Gavin and he kept rambling.

“I just…I like you. I do. And I want…I like you because of what you did for me, what you did for Elijah and Chloe. I like that we can fucking insult each other left and right and I…”

Gavin trailed off for a split second but again didn’t let Nines get a word in.

“I want to know if I like all of you. I want to…I want that chance. And I can’t get that chance if you’re not going to give me anything certain and I’d rather just quit this now rather than being fucking confused because you won’t—”

“Gavin.” The words were sharp and sudden as Nines cut him off but not unkind. Gavin finally quieted as Nines said, “When this is done, I’ll need to accompany Janay and Dipsikha back to their parents in DC.”

“Oh, right well—”

“You really need to learn what having a conversation means and stop monologue-ing over people,” chuckled Nines.

“Fuck you,” Gavin grumbled but he stayed quiet this time as Nines continued.

“As I was saying, I must go back to DC. But if you want a promise, then I will come back,” Nines said. He walked up to him, putting his hands on Gavin’s shoulders. “Not some arbitrary, sometime, and certainly not a month or a week away. I will come straight back. I promise.”

Gavin blinked. It had been the kind of answer he’d been hoping for and yet he still couldn’t help but be surprised. “You…you mean that?”

Nines chuckled again, his scarred hand coming up to cup Gavin’s face. “I mean it. I’ll come straight back. If you want to try this, then we’ll try this.”

For a moment, the shock of Nines’ promise had Gavin freezing up, but then he swiftly pushed himself up and onto his tiptoes. He grabbed Nines’ cheeks and kissed him hard. He felt Nines’ arms wrapping around him, pulling him closer. He tilted his head, widened his lips and pushed Gavin’s mouth open. Gavin slid his tongue against the android’s before Nines just barely pulled away and dragged Gavin’s lower lip towards him with his teeth.

Gavin let out a strangled gasp which Nines was quick to cover up again with his own lips but Gavin pushed him back just a bit. “We-the girls are right in the living room.”

“Then learn to be quiet,” Nines practically purred, the words almost like a command.

The heat in Gavin’s stomach came to an all time high as Nines kissed him again before suddenly moving back and easily stripping off his shirt. Gavin followed, nowhere near as graceful not that it bothered him too much. It was easy to forget about how uncoordinated he was next to the android when all he could really focus on was how Nines’ lips felt.

Nines easily picked him up once down to his boxers. Gavin felt his back hit the bed. There, the passion slowed a bit. Nines pulled back as his scarred hand slowly traveled over Gavin’s scars, in particular the one Nines had caused. The touches were light as a feather and it was impossible to predict where Nines’ fingers would touch him next.

The android readjusted, leaning down to press equally feather light kisses to the scar tissue. Gavin made a noise in the back of his throat. He threw one of his arms over his face both to hide and to bite at his skin in an attempt to stop the noises trying to escape his lips.

“Oh no,” Nines whispered as he gently pulled Gavin’s arm away. “I want to see you.” He bent down, softly pressing a kiss to Gavin’s neck just as he thrust against him, grazing Gavin through the boxers.

Gavin gasped.

“Quiet Gavin,” Nines whispered again.

That just made Gavin want to cry out all the more as he barely held on to any semblance of control. Nines continued his slow, carefully controlled motions as Gavin desperately pushed his hips up and against Nines all while trying not to make a sound.

As Gavin tried to pull their bodies closer, Nines whispered, “Show me.”

Gavin arched his hips and Nines slipped his boxers off, the sudden rush of air causing Gavin to shiver and he hid the moan in Nines’ mouth.

Nines’ scarred, textured hand moved down, caressing Gavin as he desperately tried to rut against the android. The small touches and slower nature evaporated as Gavin desperately pushed against Nines and deepened the kiss all the more to try and hide his desperate moans.

“H-h-harder,” Gavin just barely whispered.

Nines complied. The friction increased, the kiss deepened to the point where Gavin could barely get any air and just as he thought he might pass out, he came hard in Nines’ hands, the moan escaping his lips as Nines pulled back just the slightest.

“You’re beautiful,” whispered Nines.

“Y-yeah. You’re…you’re not half bad yourself,” Gavin gasped out leading them both to soft, breathless laughter as Gavin pulled Nines into another, sweeter kiss. “Fuck me,” he mumbled.

“It’s nearly three in the morning and you need to sleep,” whispered Nines before a smirk showed on his face. “But perhaps tomorrow.”

Gavin would have blushed if his skin wasn’t already so damn flushed. Nines made a move to get up but Gavin kept him there. “Just stay, we can deal with it later.”

“You’ll regret that in the morning,” chuckled Nines.

“Probably but I really don’t want you or me to move for the rest of the night,” Gavin mumbled as his fatigue hit him all at once.

Nines relented, properly lying down and pulling Gavin into his arms.

“Goodnight Gavin.”

“Night,” Gavin mumbled, eyes already slipping shut as he wrapped himself around the android and fell asleep.


	3. A New Body

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A massive thank you again! It means a lot that you're enjoying this and I'm even more excited to see people talking about who Elijah's secret someone is. I promise, the next story will all be about that and this chapter has a few more hints as to what's going to go on in that story!
> 
> I hope you enjoy and thank you again for all the wonderful kudos and comments!

Gavin somewhat came out of sleep, barely feeling Nines’ fingers running through his hair. He drifted back though for what felt like a moment more, only to wake up alone this time. He rubbed at his eyes and looked down, noting that Nines had definitely been kind enough to clean him up a bit. It was hard not to smile, recalling last night. He’d been so god damn uncertain all day and for Nines to promise him that, it was hard not to feel elated.

He grabbed some clothes and hurried into the bathroom, showering and getting freshly dressed. After putting on his shoes, he checked his phone and saw that it was almost eleven. He was surprised Nines hadn’t forced him up earlier. The android also had to have fed Boo because no way would she have let him sleep in.

He walked out to the kitchen and living room. He was shocked to see Nines cooking of all things, the girls both sitting at the counter.

“I’m pretty sure I didn’t have eggs in the fridge,” Gavin commented. “And…I’m like, seventy percent sure that I haven’t ever owned a skillet.”

Nines chuckled. “Janay and I went shopping as you both slept.”

“Yeah, speaking of that, I’m surprised you didn’t drag us out of bed earlier,” Gavin said. “This is your big day after all.”

“We were up pretty late and I know humans take longer to recharge. It’s ok,” smiled Janay. “Besides, I also wanted to make sure you were both there.”

Gavin smiled at that, pleased that Janay included him in that too. Nines passed a mug over and Gavin brightened up even more. “Oh thank Christ.”

“I couldn’t very well forget how much coffee you drank,” Nines smirked. “You were running low on that too. I made sure to get you a new bag.”

“You didn’t have to.”

“I wanted to,” Nines replied with a small shrug.

The small exchange had Gavin smiling again and he quickly hid it behind his mug and took a sip.

“Also, just so you know,” Janay suddenly said, “you’re absolutely horrible at trying to keep quiet.”

Well, there went all that wonderfully brewed coffee straight up and out of his nose.

As Gavin gagged and tried to get in a clear breath, his sinuses burning from the hot drink, Dipsikha just gave a little shrug and an uncaring wave. “It’s not that big of a deal. Besides, we knew you liked each other.”

Gavin was still trying to clear his throat and was unable to respond. Nines just laughed which really wasn’t helping.

“And anyways, we walked in on our parents doing it once. You guys weren’t that bad,” Janay said.

“Oh yeah, that was gross.”

“Ok! Subject change!” Gavin finally managed to cry out. “I don’t want to think of anyone’s parents having sex right now! Just please, for the love of god let me get in one fucking sip of coffee without it shooting out my nose.”

The girls laughed much to Gavin’s dismay as he set the mug down and wiped the coffee off that had spilled over his shirt. He blew his noise and finally got around to taking another sip of his coffee while really wishing he had whiskey somewhere that he could pour into it.

“Maybe a muzzle would have worked.”

And there went the coffee again as Gavin wheeled on Dipsikha, face red and finger in the air. “I fucking swear if you—”

“Last one! I promise,” Dipsikha quickly said, hands up in surrender as Janay howled with laughter.

Nines kissed Gavin’s bright red cheek and whispered, “Hmm, could make things interesting.”

The only good thing about having the fucking android next to him meant Gavin could punch him as hard as he wanted and it didn’t hurt him. Nines didn’t even flinch. He just cocked his head and smirked as Gavin let out a pained growl.

“Eggs?” Nines offered as they finally finished.

“I don’t care that you made breakfast. You’re on thin fucking ice right now,” Gavin shot back. He shook out his hand even as he still sat by Dipsikha and Nines placed the plates in front of them. Gavin shoveled the food into his mouth and pulled out his phone to help hide his face from the others.

“So when do you want to leave Janay?” Gavin mumbled out.

“Immediately after you’re both eating if that’s ok.”

Gavin just nodded and quickly texted Elijah.

_We’ll be over in about an hour or two._

_Ok. Markus said everything is ready and set up._

_Cool._

“Everything’s good to go on their end. We can leave the moment we finish.”

Janay smiled, her excitement clearly growing though the nervous tapping of her foot was still there. Dipsikha comfortingly nudged her sister a few times, squeezed her hand. The contact seemed to help and after Gavin and Dipsikha ate, they cleaned up and were almost ready to go. Gavin went and grabbed a new shirt as he called Fowler. He coughed extra hard as the girls giggled in the background at his charade. With work taken care of, Gavin then petted Boo, and they were off.

Janay had read more of the comic Gavin had gotten her that morning while Dipsikha and him had slept. She talked about it mostly and Gavin was happy to distract her. Even Dipsikha didn’t complain about all the gore Janay kept referencing.

They got to Elijah’s house where he walked Janay through a few procedures and still double checked that she was ready despite how she kept telling him he didn’t have to. And from there, they were off again.

Elijah knew the procedure was fool proof, he’d run the numbers again and again last night just to make sure. He wasn’t nervous as much as excited. Seeing this work, having the physical evidence that it worked and not just the simulations, it would mean they could help other children. He knew Markus was already figuring out a way to make it easier for those children to go through the process and how to mass produce the equipment around the world so the children didn’t only have Detroit to come to.

When they arrived at the tower, Janay quickly said, “I want…I don’t want you all to be there. If that’s ok.”

“Yeah, yeah it’s fine,” Dipsikha murmured even as it was clear she was hesitant at leaving her sister alone.

However, Chloe put a comforting arm around her and said, “Don’t worry, Elijah won’t let anything happen to her.”

“Promise,” Elijah said.

“I’ll be ok,” Janay quickly added as she went and hugged her sister. “Trust me. I’ll see you on the other side. All of you.”

“Yeah. Ok.”

Gavin gave Janay a thumbs up before looking to his brother. Elijah nodded, confirming that everything was going to be ok and it was set. He took Janay to the elevator as Chloe guided the others to a place to wait it out. As they got into the elevator, Janay finally spoke again. She smiled, the excitement on her face showing again. “Dipsikha is going to hate that I’ll be taller than her.”

Elijah laughed at that. “You’re welcome.”

Janay grinned and started restlessly bouncing on her feet. As the elevator opened and they walked out, Janay suddenly said, “After the transfer could…could this body help provide parts for someone? Or even give birth to like, another kid? Like if an android couple wanted to adopt?”

“It could. But I’d only let something like that happen with your permission.”

“I…I think I’d like that,” murmured Janay. “I don’t want it to just…to go to waste. Not when it could help someone else.”

“Alright, I’ll make sure it’s stored but I’ll make sure there’s some time for you to really think about it,” Elijah replied.

They walked into the room from last night, Markus waiting for them. Markus had removed the skin on one of his hands as he touched the equipment, helping to configure the entire setup and make sure everything was working as it should be.

Janay immediately moved to the body that was already set up and connected to one part of the device. The skin was off though standard underclothes covered her as wires connected to the base of the neck, the midsection, and her arms.

“I’m guessing I need to undress.”

“It’s the only way to get the connectors everywhere they need to be,” Markus apologetically said.

However, Janay didn’t seem troubled. “It’s ok. I figured as much. Where do I need to stand?”

“Right here,” Elijah instructed. “The connectors will feel a bit odd but there shouldn’t be any discomfort. Essentially you’ll fall asleep and wake up in a new body.”

“Got it.”

She removed her skin and undressed. Elijah helped her up and started to connect her. She jumped at the sudden, unfamiliar touches but slowly relaxed against the machine.

“You alright?”

“Yes,” she said, unable to nod with the wire stuck to the back of her neck.

Elijah quickly moved back to the monitors, eyes moving over them to assure himself that it was all set to run. He looked back to Janay who smiled and said, “You can stop double checking. I’m ready.”

“Alright, I’ll see you soon then,” Elijah smiled.

“I’ll see you soon.”

Elijah initiated it. He kept an eye on her as her eyes flickered before slowly closing. Now to sit and monitor the process inch by inch to make sure nothing did go wrong.

“How have you been?” Markus asked. His one hand still had the skin removed as he monitored the progress from the inside.

“Good,” Elijah murmured as he didn’t remove his eyes from the monitors. “How was the West Coast?”

“Very interesting. I think we made real ground as well. I’m going to Mexico in about a week to give a speech to their congress. Josh is going to join me.”

“You’ve taken to the political sphere well,” Elijah commented.

“It’s all about strategy, even if we’re going for peace rather than a fight. North gets on my back now and again about how slow things are going but the outcome will be all the better, even if things can be a little frustrating here and there.”

“Wise words. Did you read that in one of the many books Carl recommended?”

“I think he told me those words himself,” chuckled Markus.

They both paused for a bit as they confirmed the next set of data transfer. Elijah’s eyes roamed over it. Good, everything was still in place just like he’d expected.

“How’s Leo?” Markus suddenly asked, the question a little surprising.

“He’s been at Carl’s side a lot these past months.” Elijah glanced over, his gaze softening a bit as he said, “He’s not going to bite your head off if you visit. We did spend Christmas together without incident if you remember.”

“No, it’s not that at all. Leo and I have talked. But…I had years with Carl. You even had years with him and now…I know he won’t see the end of this one,” Markus softly said.

“No, he won’t,” Elijah murmured.

“I’m worried about Leo. No one person is truly to blame, Carl did fail as a father with him in many respects just as Leo failed as a son,” Markus said. “But I’ve been collecting information on addiction and the risks involved with relapse. He’s lost his social circle, which considering what it was comprised of is probably for the best. But he’s had trouble finding real friends which means he doesn’t have much in the way of support and neither do I think he’s ready for Carl to pass away.”

“I also don’t think I’m ready for the day I say goodbye for good,” Elijah softly replied.

“Neither am I. But with Leo…”

“I understand.”

Markus nodded. “It will hit him hardest. The guilt and regret, the lost time. The last thing Carl would want would be for his son to relapse because of his death.”

They paused again as they observed the end of one data transfer and the beginning of the next one.

“I’ll look after him,” murmured Elijah. He thought back to all the times he’d met with Leo. He remembered how the first time they’d met, how Leo had just stared at him with pure hatred and contempt. It was remarkable how times had changed. Elijah glanced towards Markus. He hadn’t told him, there never being a good time, but he hoped his gaze got the point across.

The android gave a slight nod of understanding and Elijah was happy he didn’t have to say more.

“I was thinking of visiting Carl before I left for Mexico. Perhaps you’d like to come too?”

“I would very much enjoy that,” replied Elijah with a soft smile. Technically, there were plans set for tomorrow but Carl of course didn’t leave the house really at all anymore. It would be nice to see both Carl and Leo together as Elijah had been a little distant. Again he was trying to allow them to have as much time together as was left.

The next transfer occurred.

“Everything’s going as planned,” murmured Elijah. “I just wish there was a way to wirelessly and more quickly do this without the risk of corruption.”

“If anyone can figure it out, it’s you.”

“You flatter me,” chuckled Elijah.

Markus smiled in return.

“You know, Gavin’s convinced me that I must go on a shopping spree with them for Janay once this is done,” Elijah said. “You should come.”

“I’m not sure…”

“You’ll make those girls’ day,” Elijah pushed. “And having you as a buffer to Gavin’s idiocy would be nice.”

Markus laughed good and hard at that. However, he shook his head and said, “I don’t see why they’d want me there. They like you more.”

“No, they talk to me more, there’s a difference. If you’re stuck between Superman and Lois Lane, you’re obviously going to be more wowed by Superman but Lois Lane is probably a lot easier to talk to.”

“Did you just compare yourself to Lois Lane?”

“Don’t judge me. It was the first comparison that came to mind.”

Markus laughed again, actually covering his mouth with his free hand as he leaned back.

“Don’t you dare repeat that to Gavin! He wouldn’t let me hear the end of it,” groaned Elijah.

“My lips are sealed,” promised Markus as the last pass over occurred. “Alright, it should be approximately done in five more minutes.”

They both turned silent, completely focused on those final numbers being passed over. Elijah just barely got up from his chair, leaning forward and glancing to the two androids. He glanced back at the monitor, standing up just a little more. Almost there…

“Done,” said Markus.

Elijah rushed over. He tilted her head up and pressed a point right on the back of her neck. Her eyes fluttered open. She gasped and jerked forward just the slightest.

“Shh, shh careful. Do you know where you are?”

“Y…yes. It…was just like you—” She stopped, blinking a bit and becoming more aware. “Is that my voice?”

Elijah chuckled. “Yes, it’s your voice. Welcome to teenagehood.”

Her lips quirked up as she tried to move more, the cables on her jerking just a bit.

“Hang on just a moment ok,” Elijah gently eased. “Now, just to make sure, tell me, do you know where you are?”

“Yes, Cyberlife. It was…like you said. I fell asleep and woke up.” She paused for a second, fully smiling as she added, “My name is Janay and you’re Elijah Kamski and that’s the deviant leader Markus right behind you. Just in case if you wanted to ask me anything else.”

Elijah chuckled again as what little nervousness he’d felt evaporated. It had worked just as it should. “Hold on and we’ll get you out of there.”

Both Elijah and Markus went around her, removing the wires and tubes. The moment she was free, she tried to move forward but fell, Elijah and Markus just barely catching her in time.

“Easy now. You’re used to having much shorter legs,” Elijah reminded her. He nodded to Markus who let go to go grab a simple shirt and pants so she could better cover up when she first applied her skin.

As she sat back, she felt the side of her temple. “I’ve never had an LED before. My parents removed mine before they woke me up.”

“It’s pre-implanted in all the parts but you can still remove it if you want,” Elijah said.

Janay looked to Markus as he came back over with the clothes. “Should I?”

“It’s up to you. I removed mine because I had to hide but I know some androids wear theirs as a symbol of pride now with their freedom. It’s up to you ultimately.”

“I…I guess I’ll think about it,” Janay finally fell on.

“Yes, there’s no rush. It’s all up to you,” Elijah assured her. He helped her to her feet and made sure to hold on to her as she took the clothes and carefully put them on.

With the pants and shirt on, she pressed the area around her LED and her skin moved across her. She watched as it appeared across her fingers and completely covered her.

“Let’s take a few steps.”

Elijah and Markus walked her back and forth as her mind readjusted to the new height and length of her limbs. When Elijah and Markus finally stepped back, Janay slowly walked over to her old body.

“So it’s just…empty now.”

“Yes,” Elijah replied. He kept his distance, letting her take it in. Janay touched her old face before going to touch her new cheek.

“Can I have a mirror?”

“Are you ready to see yourself? Remember, you can go as slowly as you want.”

“I…I’m ok. I want to see what I am now.”

Markus went and grabbed a mirror, handing it over as Janay slowly revealed to herself what she looked like. Her head turned as she inspected her new eyes and nose, lips, chin. She held the mirror a little farther away to get a better look at herself.

“I’m…I’m a…” Janay stopped, her voice cracking as tears started to prick at her eyes.

“Hey—”

Before Elijah could say more, she was hugging him tightly, her larger body allowing her to rest her head against his chest as the tears came.

“T-thank y-you. Tha-thank you.” She was just barely able to get the words out as she hugged him all the tighter. Elijah wrapped his arms around her and squeezed as Markus put a comforting hand on her shoulder as well.

“You’re welcome Janay,” Elijah murmured.

For a moment, they just stood there as Janay let out all her emotions. Once she’d stopped crying and wiped at her eyes, Elijah had her go through a few more simple tests just to familiarize her with her new body. Markus took notes for later and finally, she put her shoes on and stood up again.

“I’m ready to see everyone,” she smiled, only joy on her face again.

“Then let’s go see them,” replied Elijah. He kept a hand on her just in case as they walked out of the room and back to the elevator, Markus sticking close just in case too.

Elijah pulled out his phone to locate where Chloe had taken everyone else and then they headed that way. They walked into what had once been a boardroom of sorts. Unsurprisingly, Gavin’s legs were up on the table as he lounged back. Nines was sitting by him as Dipsikha was in the middle of braiding Chloe’s hair.

They all froze though upon looking towards the door before jumping to their feet.

“Oh my god, Janay!” Dipsikha cried.

Elijah let her go as the sisters rushed to each other and hugged. Dipsikha pulled back just enough so she could she her sister’s face. One of her hands came up to touch her cheek. She held her, looked over the changes and finally focused on her eyes.

“It is you.”

“It’s me,” Janay whispered before the two hugged again and then Dipsikha pulled back—

“Hang on! Are you-you are taller than me damn it!”

Janay laughed. “You’re damn right I am.”

Dipsikha pouted. “I’m just going to have to wear taller heals than you.”

“With your coordination, I don’t think so,” smirked Janay.

“You’re awful!” Dipsikha laughed, playfully shoving her sister as Janay pushed her back.

However before Janay could respond, Gavin was walking around the table and said, “Elijah, I can’t believe you.”

Everyone froze. Elijah blinked in confusion. “What?”

“All your damn fluffing up of your appearance and focus on aesthetic and fucking looking good and this! This is what you get for a first time teenager to wear!”

Janay laughed as everyone else immediately relaxed, rolling their eyes and softly chuckling too.

“He’s the one who grabbed them,” Elijah quickly said as he pointed to Markus.

“Way to throw me under the bus,” laughed Markus.

“Well then I guess you’re just going to have to go on our shopping spree too to make up for this shit show here,” Gavin said as he crossed his arms.

“Elijah already convinced me to,” replied Markus.

“That’s a win for brothers thinking alike,” grinned Gavin as he held up his hand. Elijah rolled his eyes but caved and gave him the high five all the same.

“Simon wanted to do something today, how about I pick him up and we can all meet up downtown,” Markus said.

“Sounds good to me,” replied Elijah.

Janay’s eyes were practically sparkling with the idea that they were going to go shopping and she was only more excited to hear Markus was joining them.

With everything planned, they started to leave Cyberlife, Gavin making a point to nudge Elijah in his shoulder on the way out. “You did good bro.”

“Yeah, I did,” Elijah softly smiled.

On the ride over, Janay messed with her hair color, deciding exactly what style she wanted.

“Now I need to get some dye and color my hair,” Dipsikha grinned. “What color should I do?”

They talked about it and Dipsikha also made a point to finish Chloe’s braid as well. It was the Viking style that Dipsikha had suggested earlier and everyone agreed that it did look badass as Chloe politely blushed at all the attention.

Gavin was finding it hard not to smile. Usually there was something that would at least help him keep with the grouchy persona but he didn’t even feel like insulting Nines that much today. It was all just incredibly nice and it felt good seeing Janay so happy and seemingly comfortable in her new skin.

As promised, they met up with Markus and Simon downtown. Funnily enough, whereas Janay was clearly more taken with Markus, it seemed Dipsikha had researched other members of Markus’ main group and was even more blown away by getting to meet Simon, immediately rattling off some of his activist and political work that he’d done alongside Markus.

And if Markus had been a little embarrassed and mostly flattered, well Simon was the exact opposite having no idea how to react to the attention being shown his way. When words failed Simon, Markus easily stepped in and helped as Dipsikha kept the questions coming.

They walked around, and it wasn’t surprising the stares that kept getting thrown their way considering the company with them. The fact that it was such a large group though kind of made it harder for people to just go up to Elijah or Markus as they recognized them. Both were of course gracious when someone did manage to approach them. They both used quick words and overly charismatic smiles to get people to go away quicker as they made it very clear that this was all for Janay though and they were going to make sure they weren’t hogged down by others.

The first store the group crowded into had everyone going around and grabbing random things and shouting suggestions as the store clerks mostly stood off to the side, staring with wide eyes.

Janay grabbed a leather jacket and threw it over her shoulders just as she made her hair turn blue.

“What do you think?” she asked.

“Very punk,” Gavin said with a thumbs up.

“But what else to go with it though?” mused Elijah. He picked a shirt from the wrack. “What about this?”

“I think it would look nice but I think this color would bring out her eyes more,” Simon suggested.

“Excellent choice,” Elijah replied.

“You know, not everything has to match,” muttered Gavin.

“Clearly you’ve never been a teenage girl,” smirked Chloe.

“Well technically neither were you!”

“Isn’t it the job of a detective to get inside the mind of the target?” Nines asked. “You simply need to embrace your inner teenage girl.”

“That was so weird that I don’t think I ever want to hear those words out of your mouth again,” Gavin deadpanned.

“It’s not that hard,” Simon shyly tried. “You just need to know your colors.”

“Well that won’t happen,” Elijah said. “He’s practically color blind.”

“Oh, and you aren’t?” Gavin retorted. “Half the things in your house are gray.”

“It’s not my fault you gave me a gray tabby for a cat.”

“I wasn’t talking about Spooner! I was talking about everything else in your house!”

“I use gray because I prefer it. You would use charcoal gray, silver, and light black all in the same outfit because you’d think they were the same,” Elijah replied.

“Aren’t they basically the same?”

Elijah and Simon both made faces, glancing at each other and just shaking their heads as both let out a long sigh. Markus laughed next to them.

“What! They’re totally the same color.”

Nines softly chuckled. “You’re cute when you’re confused.”

“I’m not confused! I just don’t see how you can have like seven different versions of gray.”

“There’s actually many more versions,” said Markus, “and that’s not including the versions we can’t see in normal lighting.”

“Can we just focus back on how this is about Janay? Not me and my apparent lack of fashion sense?” groaned Gavin.

“Gladly,” Elijah said as sarcasm dripped from his voice. “It was making me depressed.”

Gavin shoved Elijah and Elijah laughed in response.

They quickly focused back on actually picking out clothes rather than just arguing about it. Janay tried on a great deal as they went from store to store, only pausing as Dipsikha, Elijah, and Gavin grew hungry.

Near the end of it, it seemed like everyone was carrying something for Janay, Elijah sparing no expense to make sure she had plenty to choose from when she got home. It wasn’t just clothes either but shoes and jewelry mixed in too. Janay didn’t have to worry about makeup if she ended up wanting to put some on though. Elijah had already installed a standard set for her skin color with her permission. For the moment, Janay was keeping with her normal setting though, still getting used to what she looked like now as she couldn’t help but glance at herself in every reflective surface they passed.

Eventually, the shopping spree was finally slowing to a stop as Janay now had more than enough options to choose from for well over seven days.

The girls said their goodbyes to Markus and Simon, Elijah taking a moment to set a date and time to go visit Carl with him. Then it was back to Elijah’s home where he said goodbye to both girls.

“Give me your phone,” Elijah said at one point and Janay handed hers over. He typed a few things and then handed it back. “There, now if you ever need me, you can contact me. Though I warn you, if you give that number to your parents and I find myself being hounded over political strategies and sponsorships, I will hurt you.”

Janay and Dipsikha both laughed as it was obvious Elijah only meant it teasingly. “Don’t worry. Our parents will never know,” said Dipsikha.

Janay nodded and added, “So I can ask you about getting a sense like taste implemented?”

“Yes, but I suggest you wait at least a month beforehand as you grow accustomed to your body. After that, we can talk about it again. Ok?”

“Got it,” Janay said. She hugged Elijah again and Dipsikha did so too, softly thanking him for what he’d done.

Elijah hugged them back and said, “If I don’t see you again before you go back, I wish you the best of luck and look forward to when we meet again.”

“Me too,” Janay smiled.

They said goodbye to Chloe who also wished Janay luck and then it was just the girls and Gavin and Nines back in Gavin’s car.

“It’s been a busy day,” Nines said as Gavin drove back towards the city. “I hope you didn’t feel too overwhelmed.”

“I did a little here and there. But it was worth it,” Janay smiled. “It’s…it’s so weird being closer to other’s heights. I feel like I should still be looking up but for the most part I don’t have to. Not drastically anyways.”

“Yeah, excluding Treebeard over here,” Gavin said as he gestured towards Nines.

The girls laughed even though Dipsikha had to ask, “What’s a Treebeard?”

Gavin made a little gasping sound and asked, “Are you girls in the mood for another movie?”

“Sure,” they said.

“In that case I sure as hell know what we’re watching tonight!”

Dipsikha rolled her eyes. “Is it going to be as bad as the movie from last night?”

“Hey, first of all, that movie was chosen at random. Second of all, this film is a god damn masterpiece. You’ll thank me for it,” smirked Gavin.

“Does it at least have some romance?” sighed Dipsikha.

“It’s got everything from heartbreaking romance to humans and orcs and elves and dwarves and ghosts fighting for the fate of the world, and everything in between. Trust me, you’ll love it.”

The girls laughed at Gavin’s overexcited face. They ended up stopping at a store along the way to grab some snack type food for Gavin and Dipsikha in place of dinner and then ended up back at Gavin’s home.

He set up the bed again and got the TV ready. It was relatively early, especially compared to last night, so Gavin made sure to set up the extended version.

“Wait, is this a TV show or something?” asked Janay.

“Nope. First film of a trilogy.”

“It’s three hours long! Over in fact!” cried Dipsikha.

“Yeah, three hours of kick ass.”

“Alright, we’ll ignore how bad last night’s movie was and give you the benefit of the doubt,” Janay smirked.

“If it helps, it’s received ninety-eight awards out of one hundred and fifty two nominations,” Nines replied, easily looking up information on the movie. “I don’t think it will be quite as bad as the last one.”

Gavin rolled his eyes.

“When was it made?” asked Dipsikha.

“Two thousand and one,” said Gavin.

“That’s really old,” Janay replied.

“It’s not that old!”

“Were you even alive then?”

“Well…no. But that’s beside the point! It’s an awesome movie and we’re going to watch and enjoy it!” Gavin declared as the girls just rolled their eyes.

They all camped out on the bed again, Boo coming over and curling up on Dipsikha as she sniffed at Janay and the new smells. Gavin eased up just a bit next to Nines, more comfortable than the night before and maybe just leaning on him a bit. The girls asked questions and Gavin easily answered them as he’d seen the movies a hundred times over.

He’d been right though. The girls enjoyed it, finding something great and fun about the characters and connecting plots. They asked about the second one and it didn’t take much convincing for Gavin to pop that one in.

Despite how much Gavin loved the films though, it had been a long day and last night had screwed up his sleep schedule. Eventually he did start to doze off with Dipsikha, Janay setting herself to fall asleep soon too, and before Gavin knew it he was cracking his eyes open as light shined in through the window.

He had slumped further and further down and, probably with the help of Nines, had been pulled into the androids lap. He could feel Nines’ fingers running through his hair, fingernails gently grazing his scalp.

Gavin let out a low, content sigh and murmured, “Have you been like that all night?”

“I don’t need to charge as often as other androids,” Nines replied. “Besides, it’s nice watching you sleep. You look peaceful.”

“Are you saying I don’t look peaceful when I’m awake?”

“You look like you’re ready to fight everyone in a five mile radius.”

“Damn right,” smirked Gavin as he yawned and finally sat up. Janay was blinking awake beside him as Dipsikha still rolled around on the bed, pulling a pillow over her head to block out the noise and sound.

“I promised Fowler I’d be at work today,” Gavin sighed. “Will probably be a full day too.”

Janay sat up and said, “That’s ok. We still have a lot more on our list to get done. I’m sure we’ll be well distracted.”

Dipsikha softly grumbled, the words barely discernible as, “Shut up.”

Gavin softly laughed before getting up. He went ahead and fed Boo before going to the shower. It was quick and then he was back in the living room, Nines was already making breakfast. The smells seemed to have enticed Dipsikha out of bed as she ran her fingers through her hair as best she could while she sat at the counter

“Urgh, we need to actually go back to the hotel today. I need to shower,” she groaned.

“Oh you’re not that bad. It’s certainly not like when you were nine years old and refused to take a bath for a week,” Janay replied.

Gavin snorted at that and then quickly hid the smile behind the coffee cup that Nines had just handed him. Dipsikha just glared at her sister. “We don’t speak about that.”

“We can go to the hotel this morning and then get back to the places you wanted to visit,” Nines said before Janay could respond.

“Ok…I guess that sounds good,” Dipsikha replied. She looked to Gavin. “Can we finish the second movie tonight?”

“Hell yeah. Don’t know exactly when I’ll be home. I’ll text ahead when I get an idea,” Gavin said. This time he stayed standing as Nines handed him a plate and Gavin shoveled the food down his throat extra quickly.

“Really?” Nines asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Hey, it’s probably best if I get in a little early today. And if I get in early, I may leave early,” replied Gavin, mouth completely full.

“That logic is sound but I would suggest not choking yourself to death in the process,” mused Nines as the girls laughed.

Gavin forced himself to swallow. “I survived a bullet to my stomach. I’ll be fine.”

“It didn’t hit your stomach. It hit—”

“The general area then! You get it,” Gavin said with a wave of his hand. He forced more food down his throat and finished it off with the cup of coffee. “I’ll see you later tonight.”

He made to go grab his shoes but before he could, Nines grabbed him by the waste and pulled him over. The kiss was feather light though and Gavin couldn’t help the small, unsuspecting gasp escape his lips.

“Is this a thing now?” Gavin breathlessly said.

“It could be a thing if you want it to be a thing,” Nines smirked.

“I think I’d like it to be a thing.”

“Don’t you have work?” Janay deadpanned.

Gavin jolted as he realized the girls were just sitting at the counter and making pointed stares at them. He quickly pushed Nines back and rushed to his shoes. “Yes, exactly. Work. Lock up when you leave please!”

He was still forcing one of his shoes onto his foot as he hopped out the door and slammed it behind him, cutting off the laughter there. Gavin let out an exasperated sigh, even if his lips were trying to quirk up into a smile. He got his shoe properly on only to suddenly realize he’d left his keys inside. Gavin cursed and tried to remember where he’d left them.

They should just be on the coffee table which they’d pushed to the side to do up the couch…if he was fast enough, he could probably rush in and out before anyone could say anything.

Gavin let out a tired sigh and rushed back in. He went to the coffee table, eyes zeroing in on where the keys would be. His hand was even reaching towards it before his brain processed that they weren’t there. But he could have sworn—

He heard the keys jingle and looked up to see Nines holding them.

“Alright you bastard,” grumbled Gavin. “Will you just—”

As Gavin tried to snatch the keys, Nines let him but quickly grabbed Gavin’s wrist and pulled him in close. Nines kissed him again and Gavin relaxed against the android before he could stop.

He could feel Nines’ smile pressed to his lips before the android pulled back and Gavin breathlessly got out, “I think I’d really like this to be a thing.”

“I know I would,” smirked Nines.

“Work?” reminded Dipsikha.

“Right! Bye!” Gavin darted to the door, shoving his keys in his pocket and automatically checking that everything else was there except…

Thankfully he hadn’t gone out the door yet as he realized his phone was gone. But he knew that he’d had it on him. It had…

“Oh you pick pocketing little shit!”

Nines laughed as Gavin spun around and walked back towards him. Gavin grabbed his phone and this time pushed himself up on his toes to roughly kiss Nines.

“Ha, got to you first,” Gavin said.

“Only because I let you.”

“Yeah right—”

“Work?!” the girls said in unison.

“Leaving! Bye!”

Gavin finally managed to get out of his apartment with everything on him as he quickly walked down the hall and to the stairs. Even as his lips were trying to smile, he couldn’t help but wonder how long this would last. He hoped it worked, wanted it to work in the long run. And he supposed that if he was willing to try and Nines was, then it might just happen.

He hadn’t had a serious relationship in a while, the lack of a spark and work often getting in the way being the main reason nothing lasted. But there was definitely a spark here and Nines understood his work better than others just as Gavin could already predict there’d be times the android would have to leave for a private case.

It was the nature of the job. But the fact they’d had a chance to work together, that they were familiar with each other, it made Gavin even more hopeful for what could last.

And that feeling of being hopeful, of wanting it to last, that had Gavin just smiling more despite his best efforts. Because at the core, he hadn’t been willing to try with any other relationship. But this, he could tell he was willing to try with the asshole of an android.

The moment Gavin got into work, he heard Fowler calling him to come in his office. Gavin let out a soft groan but went anyways. It started off pretty simple, Fowler just informing him on a case he needed Gavin to take.

With all the information sent to Gavin’s desk, he said, “Anything else?”

“Yes.” Fowler swiveled his monitor around. “Really sick yesterday. Huh?”

Gavin looked at the distant photo that was posted underneath the headline, _Markus and Kamski spotted with group in public_.

They were all in the photo, mid-walk down the street.

“Well you know how it is with siblings chief,” Gavin shrugged. “You just want to be nice to your co-workers but you don’t give a shit if your brother gets sick.”

“I don’t have siblings.”

“You know, I think that explains a—”

“Out Reed! And don’t pull this shit again.”

Gavin just held his hands up, deciding this really wasn’t the battle to fight Fowler on. He quickly exited the office and headed to his desk to catch up on the case. He groaned at seeing it but couldn’t really complain considering he had lied about being sick yesterday. Of course Fowler would give him some bullshit that on a good day, would be open and shut but according to this had little to no uncorrupted evidence thanks to the spot it had all gone down.

Gavin just strapped in for what was probably going to be a long day. He talked with the officers involved with securing the scene as best they could, talked with what witnesses had come forward, and went to the scene as well.

Once back at the office, Hank walked by with a grin.

“I see Fowler gave you the Briggs Case.”

Gavin just let out another groan and sighed, “It’s my own damn fault for being caught in a lie.”

“Admitting fault, huh Reed? Is that some character development I see?”

“Oh fuck off Anderson,” Gavin grumbled.

“Gavin, how was the outing?” Connor asked, coming up to stand by Gavin’s desk before Hank would have left of his own accord.

Gavin just rubbed at his eyes. Well, if they were going to crowd his desk, then so be it. He pulled out his phone and brought up some of the pictures he’d taken yesterday, a good deal of Janay as she’d tried on clothes and had wanted to see what she looked like.

“Oh, is that the teenage android?” asked Connor.

“Huh, so Kamski really did manage to age her up,” Hank said. Connor must have filled him in on the story before now.

“Yeah so we all went on a shopping spree and Markus and Simon got dragged into it too…”

Gavin kept talking as he flipped through the pictures he had and showed them off. After a few minutes though, Fowler came out of his office and walked over with a glare on his face. “I trust we’re reviewing crime scene photos gentlemen?”

“Of course Jeffrey. What do you take us for?” asked Hank.

“Children that I still question as to why I keep employed,” Fowler deadpanned with a sigh. “Get back to work.”

“We are working,” Gavin said.

“Real work Detective Reed,” Fowler growled as he walked away.

Once he was well out of earshot, Hank said, “If Jeffrey ever gets a heart attack, I think he’ll be able to directly link us three to it.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” Gavin said, “but I only heard a challenge.”

Connor just rolled his eyes as Hank laughed at that and walked back over to his desk. Connor stuck around though and said, “And what about Nines? How is it that going?”

“He’s staying. At least that’s what we’ve agreed on so far,” Gavin said.

“I’m still very confused as to how this is a thing at all, but if you’re happy, I’m happy.”

“Thank you Connor.”

Connor smiled and said his goodbyes, meaning all Gavin could do was focus on work. At least up until he got a text message from Nines.

_The girls have a flight set to leave tomorrow._

Gavin frowned at that though he’d known it would have to come sooner or later. _So soon?_

_They are excited to get back to their parents. And remember, Janay will be back for her own upgrades._

_I know. I know. What time’s the flight?_

_Two o’clock. If we’re to finish the movie tonight as the girls wish, then perhaps I could go ahead and check us out and bring all their things to your apartment._

_Yeah, that’s fine with me. I’ll text you when I know I’ll be back._

_See you tonight._

With that finished, Gavin quickly texted Elijah as well.

_The girls are leaving tomorrow. I’m going to try and see them off. Want to come?_

_Time?_

_Two._

_I can’t sadly. Have plans I can’t cancel. Give them my best._

_Plans? You don’t do anything._

_I do have a life._

_Yeah, a life being a hermit._

_I don’t just sit in my house all day._

_I’ll believe it when I see it._

Gavin could imagine his brother rolling his eyes at that before responding, _Tell them I wish them the best._

_I will._

Gavin pocketed his phone and sighed. Well, there went all his good reasons to push off work. He turned back to the computer and quickly continued the investigation.

It went on for a while before he could finally text Nines to say he was going back to his apartment soon. When he finally logged off, it was with a sigh of relief and Gavin left the precinct. He double checked to see if Dipsikha wanted him to pick anything up for a late dinner. He ended up stopping at a fast food place, grabbed a mountain load of crap, and then headed home.

As he walked in, the girls’ suitcases were off to the side and the bed remade. They were already sitting on it with Nines by their side, the TV ready and at the exact part they’d left off on.

“Hey. So what did you do today?” asked Gavin as he kicked off his shoes. He walked over and fell in next to them, handing over one of the bags of food to Dipsikha. He listened to them describe some of the stores they’d gone to and places they’d been but they rushed through everything and sped by details.

Dipsikha waved her hand. “Let’s just get back to the movie! I mean, we stopped in the middle of a battle. I need to know what happens!”

Gavin laughed, only too happy to oblige them as he pressed play and they all settled in. They finished the second movie and the girls adamantly said they were awake enough for the third. Even when Dipsikha got a little sleepy, she managed to stay awake throughout the final film up to the credits and then promptly passed out. This time Gavin got up to turn the TV off and helped Nines pull the blankets more over the girls before retiring to Gavin’s room.

Gavin just barely managed to get out a long yawn before Nines spun him around, picking him up and pulling him to the bed. He kissed him, slow and deep before Gavin pushed back and said, “As nice as this is, I do not need another morning full of them harassing me and my volume.”

Nines chuckled and simply fell back against the pillows, Gavin quickly following. Nines wrapped Gavin up in his arms. It felt nice, sleeping with another warm body next to him. He wrapped an arm around Nines.

“So, are you going to stay here?” mumbled Gavin as another yawn escaped his throat.

“I thought we’d already discussed this.”

“We did. I don’t-I mean-I don’t mean like Detroit. I mean here. As in…do you want to stay here in my apartment?”

“Would you like me to?”

“I think the fact that I’m asking you makes the answer pretty obvious,” Gavin said with a roll of his eyes. “But…it doesn’t matter what I’m thinking. I just want to know what you want.”

“Well in that case…I’ve never lived with someone before. I basically lived at the office anyways because there wasn’t much of a reason to stay in a mainly empty apartment. But with you…I think I would very much like that,” Nines said, one of his hands coming up and slowly combing Gavin’s hair.

“Hmm, and you’re going to stick with the private eyeing and everything?”

“For now, yes. Why? Do you need help at work?” teased Nines.

“I worked by myself as a detective for five years and that doesn’t even include my time as a god damn officer. I’m fine at work you tin can,” Gavin grumbled.

“Well if you say so,” chuckled Nines.

“I do say so. Stay in your fucking lane and I’ll stay in mine,” Gavin replied. He paused for a second before adding, “Though you can definitely keep doing that with your fingers for however long you want.”

Nines softly laughed, continuing the motion as Gavin curled in next to him and closed his eyes. Gavin let out a long, tired sigh and then slowly fell asleep. The last thing he felt was Nines continuing the motion through his hair and then he was groggily waking up again.

Gavin could feel Nines’ fingers still in his hair but his hand was frozen in position rather than moving. Gavin glanced up to see Nines’ eyes closed as he sat perfectly still. Gavin decided to take advantage of it and simply rested against Nines’ chest again. He closed his eyes, dozing off for a moment before he heard Boo’s hungry yowl coming from his door. Gavin sighed, shifting and making it clear he was going to have to force himself out of bed.

He felt Nines moving. His eyes fluttered open as Gavin looked up. “I’m surprised I didn’t wake you up earlier.”

“I decided to stay asleep until you were ready to get up.”

“Wait, you can just do that? Like you’re aware of all the shit going around?”

“In a way. I’m not conscious like I am now but I have sensors to wake myself in case of danger.”

“Huh, that’s pretty damn useful.”

“It is,” chuckled Nines.

“I guess I have the most OP android,” Gavin grinned.

“And I have a somewhat average detective.”

“Ok, that was fucking rude.”

“But you look so cute when irritated.”

“I guess I’m real fucking cute now then, huh?” grumbled Gavin.

“Extra.”

Gavin blushed and Nines kissed him just as Boo yowled again and pawed at the door.

“Her highness awaits,” Nines sarcastically said.

Of course, Gavin took the wording quite seriously and replied, “You’re god damn right she’s your highness. She’s a fucking queen.”

Nines rolled his eyes as Gavin pushed himself up and headed back out into the living room. Dipsikha was still asleep but Janay was up with the comic out.

“Oh, what part are you at?” Gavin whispered.

She showed him the pictures and softly talked to him before going back to reading. Gavin went into the kitchen again and made some quick toast and started the coffee maker. Nines came up behind him and asked, “Would you like me to make you something?”

“Naw, better to go in as early as possible today. Feel free to make something for Dipsikha though.”

Speaking of her, Dipsikha poked her head up from behind the couch. “You’re leaving now?”

“Don’t worry, I’ll use my lunch break to make it to the airport and see you both off,” Gavin promised. Nines leaned over and Gavin kissed him automatically. God he could really get used to that. He headed to the front door and added, “Have a good morning. See you in a few hours.”

“Bye,” Janay said.

Gavin pulled his shoes on and then as a last minute thought, he quickly checked his pockets without breaking eye contact with Nines. “I’m watching you.”

Nines just smirked as Gavin finally turned and left once he knew he had everything he needed. This time he didn’t screw around and once at work, went straight to the paperwork and cases. He only said the briefest of hellos to Connor before focusing back on his work and then booking it out of there and to the airport with plenty of time to spare.

He texted Nines to figure out exactly where they were. He hurried inside and ran over to the line they were still in.

“Sorry, traffic was hell,” grumbled Gavin as he let out a deep breath. He looked to Janay and shook his head. “They grow up so fast. I could have sworn you were only this tall when I first met you.”

Dipsikha laughed and Janay rolled her eyes. She opened her mouth, ready to say something but decided against it. Instead, she just launched forward and hugged Gavin as tightly as possible. “Thank you for everything.”

“Hey, no need for that. I just bought you a good comic and introduced you to my weird ass brother,” Gavin chuckled as he hugged her back. Dipsikha joined in, both girls squeezing tight before finally backing off again.

“Hopefully we’ll be back in Detroit soon,” said Dipsikha. “We’ll miss you.”

Janay nodded.

“Yeah, well I’ll miss you twerps too,” Gavin grudgingly admitted. He looked to Nines. “When are you coming back?”

“I’m not sure yet. At the latest, I’ll get a plane back tomorrow,” Nines replied. His lips softened into a smile. “Promise.”

“Well yeah you will. If you didn’t I’d hunt you down and hit you upside the head,” Gavin replied with his arms crossed.

“Like you could find me if I really didn’t want you to?”

“You may be an OP android but you haven’t dealt with the tenacity of a fucking angry boyfriend.”

“So you are my boyfriend?” grinned Nines.

“That’s not the part you’re supposed to focus on!”

Nines went in for a kiss as Gavin went bright red and a call for, “Next!” occurred.

“I’ll likely see you tomorrow,” Nines murmured with a smile.

“Bye Gavin!” Dipsikha said as they started to walk towards their first checkpoint.

“Yeah, and invest in some soundproof walls!” Janay added.

“You know on second thought, I’m not going to miss either of you! Good riddance!”

The girls laughed, Nines grinning alongside them. Gavin threw back his head and groaned before stomping away, muttering to himself about fucking androids and nosy ass teenagers.

He got back to work and finished up, the only moment he really paused was to text Elijah about the girls to say they’d left.

_I know. Janay texted me._

Gavin smiled at that. He liked that it seemed a connection had grown between Elijah and Janay and it was good that he was growing more involved in helping Markus. After all, at first it had seemed like Elijah didn’t have anyone but Chloe and just aimlessly walked around his home. Speaking of all that…

_What was so important today that you couldn’t cancel?_

A few seconds passed, more than Gavin would have expected before Elijah finally said, _A meeting with Markus and some important leaders. It couldn’t be rescheduled._

_Are you sure? Because you hesitated. Why’d you hesitate???_

_I didn’t hesitate. There’s a bad connection._

_I don’t believe you._

_Believe what you want. It’s true._

Gavin rolled his eyes. True or not, he doubted he’d be able to get Elijah to tell him more and decided to just focus back on work and get home as soon as possible.

He ended up grabbing food on the way and once back, checked his phone. However, there wasn’t anything for Nines. He must have decided to stay in DC for the night. It was kind of tempting to text him something but Gavin pulled back, not wanting to appear too needy and knowing damn well Nines would tease him for it too.

He ended up just watching a movie and played with Boo before both fell asleep in Gavin’s bed. In the morning, he did his usual routine of toast and coffee before heading to work.

Gavin checked his phone again.

He sighed. Still no word on when Nines would be getting back. He wasn’t doubting the android, but he did worry that something might have happened that would cause Nines to stay longer than intended. He wanted this to work. He didn’t want something to happen that would just incrementally push them farther and farther apart before this thing they had ended before ever really beginning.

Gavin tried to let work distract him as minute after minute passed. Around two o’clock, Officer Chen came over and said, “There’s a civilian wondering if he could speak with you about a current case.”

Since Gavin wasn’t looking at her, he didn’t notice Chen’s smirk and just waved a hand. “Yeah, why not. Let him through.” At least it could lead to something interesting and would distract him since the paperwork wasn’t doing much right now.

As Gavin messed with his pencil, he heard Chen leave and then moments later, new footsteps approaching. Gavin let out a tired sigh, ready to listen to whatever useful or non useful information was about to be thrown his way until—

“I believe someone’s stolen my heart Detective Reed. I was hoping you could help me get it back.”

“Nines!”

Gavin spun around and jumped up to see Nines staring down at him with a smug smirk on his lips. “When the hell did you arrive? Why didn’t you say you were coming!?” Gavin cried as he hit Nines in the chest.

“I got back a little less than an hour ago and figured, why not surprise you,” smiled Nines.

“Yeah and give me that sappy fucking line.”

“The opportunity was too great to miss.”

“Yeah well it’s a fucking overdone one.”

“The nostalgic and familiar sound of it makes it more endearing than annoying.”

“You’re annoying.”

“You’re endearing when you’re annoyed.”

“Alright fucker—”

Before Gavin could finish the sentence, Nines suddenly pushed forward and kissed him. Gavin went bright red and just as Nines moved back, Fowler shouted, “Detective Reed! This is a police station! Not your bedroom!”

Gavin went even redder at how Fowler’s voice echoed across the office. Nines leaned in and murmured, “I’ll see you at home.”

Gavin pushed him. “Asshole!”

Nines just chuckled and quickly left after leaving behind a cup of coffee that Gavin hadn’t seen the android holding earlier. He crossed his arms and fell back into his chair, pointedly ignoring the stares as Connor walked over.

“So that just happened,” Connor commented.

“Fucking prick. He totally did all that on purpose. No fucking way for me to embarrass him at his work. I’ll just have to figure out a way to fucking get him.”

“Really?” sighed Connor with a small laugh. “Is this what the coming months are going to be like? You and him just trying to figure out ways to annoy and embarrass and get back at each other?”

 “Hell yeah! But what do you fucking do when it’s the world’s most fucking OP android?”

“Well you could always touch his LED.”

“Really? What would that do?”

“Well if myself or another android touches it, our coding expects some sort of command, like removing the skin. So when a sudden amount of contact occurs in that area but without the expected command, we kind of freeze. You have to make sure to hit it right on target though or else it won’t always work,” Connor said.

“Connor, you’re fucking wonderful.”

“I fear I’m just an enabler but if I have to choose a side then I’ll find anyway for you to get back at Nines.”

Gavin grinned. “Hell yeah! I think I’m already coming up with a plan.”

“I don’t want to know the details,” Connor said with a pointed look. “Just…good luck,” he sighed with a roll of his eyes.

Gavin just grinned in response. The plan formulated in his head. There was no way he could embarrass Nines in front of others. Even if he did something that would normally embarrass others, Gavin could easily see Nines being unfazed. He was too confident and sure of himself to care what others thought.

No, Gavin just had to focus on him and Nines and see how he might be able to turn the tables when he got home.

With that in mind, the rest of the day went quickly and by the time Gavin got home, he knew what he was going to do. As Nines had said, he was there along with a good bit of food.

“I hope you don’t think you’re going to suddenly change how I eat or some shit.”

“Not at all,” chuckled Nines. “What chances I’ve gotten to cook I’ve enjoyed though and now I have an even better reason for doing it. How was work?”

“Oh you fucking know how work was you shit. How was DC?” Gavin grumbled as he leaned against the counter and watched Nines work.

Nines talked about the girls and their parents and that reunion, along with the fact that unsurprisingly their mother asked if there was a way she could speak with Elijah. The woman was a politician through and through. They started going back and forth as Gavin laid out his work schedule and Nines talked about his plans to cement himself in Detroit and start looking for cases.

They went back and forth like this for a while, Nines finishing the food and Gavin eating. It felt good and normal, like this was something Gavin could see himself doing most days he came home. He really liked the sound of that. Of having something normal in his life after his crazy fucking year. It was kind of ironic that it was an android of all people making him feel normal but he’d gladly take what he could get.

And then that night, with the plates cleaned and most work discussed and both having wound down a bit, Nines kissed him and Gavin didn’t bother with trying to hide his breathy moan this time. They made their way to the bedroom, Nines being kind enough to break away so Gavin could breath. He leaned forward again but before he could, Gavin popped him on his LED with his finger. He kissed Nines hard, spinning the android around and throwing him onto the bed. Gavin climbed on top of him, sitting back on his lap and grinning down at him. “How does it feel to be out of control for once?”

Nines finally blinked in shock, coming out of his semi frozen state and—

“Hell fucking yes!”

“You saw nothing.”

“Oh no, you fucking blushed,” Gavin grinned as he leaned down. “Are you embarrassed? Or do you like having someone else in control for once? Hmm?”

A mischievous look occurred in Nines’ eyes as he wrapped his legs around Gavin and flipped him over. “Who’s in control now?” Nines said, even though it was obvious he was having trouble forcing down the blush on his cheeks.

“Oh, we’ll fucking see, won’t we?” grinned Gavin. He was very, very excited to see where this was going and grabbed Nines, pulling him into another hungry kiss.


End file.
